Tokusou Senshatai Dominion

New Dominion Tank Police, 6 OVA action series. Fans will immediately recognize the returning cast of Leona, Al, Brenten, Puma Sisters, and other supporting characters. Their roles and actions are pretty much maintained from the last OVA run, so you can expect about the same comedy and plot.

Since this was around the mid 90s, the animation is nothing to complain about. If you haven't seen the other Tank Police OVAs or possibly the manga, and thinking about just jumping into this one, you might wanna reconsider. For one thing I'd say the original run had a bit more deeper enemies than this one, at times ... NDTP heavily relies on its comedy to maintain the viewers enjoyment. When it can't do that and mix in the action it presents, the continuing story becomes flat and uninteresting at times. In some OVAs here, this problem is evident. But you still get kick ass explosions, cyborgs, swearing, and hilarity in about every act. There's tons of twist, some are apparently foreseeable, but that doesn't interact with the anime too much and should keep you glued.

Overall, I think this is pretty much fan based. Fans of the series should enjoy NDTP, others will probably will still but they'll have a much harder time grasping character relations and the like.

Dominion Tank Police, that says it all; a metropolis so crime riddled that the police need TANKS to keep things under control and even then, barely. This second anime adaptation of Shirow's manga retains the wacky cast and the over the top action humour of the original but raises the stakes and introduces an overarching plot that makes for some tense moments throughout the OVA.

Story - 8
A huge step up from the chaotic plot of the first Tank Police, NDTP has an overarching plot revolving around the attempts of a megacorporation specialising in armaments to undermine the tank police and assassinate the Mayor, who ... is trying to impose an embargo on weapons to the city. Most episodes are linked by the ominous background puppetering of the megacorporation and really gives you a sense of happening and high stakes. Plenty of great action sequences too from trying to stop an apartment sized truck to duelling with a relentless spider tank. Beneath all this action is the commentary on totalitarian martial rule through the irony that is the Tank Police. The Tank Police can be every bit as corrupt and arguably, even more destructive than the very criminals they fight against. If the anime took itself more seriously, we'd be seeing ALOT of civillian collateral. Overall, while more sophisticated than your average OVA plot, it is still 80/90s action anime to the core.

Art - 8
There are better looking OVAs than this one, even from the 90s. But what these sort of OVAs lack in animation detail and smoothness, it always more than makes up for in art direction and designs. Being based off a Shirow manga, there is no way the character designs and especially the mechanical designs couldn't be anything short of awesome. The setting is your typical cyberpunk megacity but unique that, it is depicted with; a bright blue sky and an abundance of greenery! All the pollution a city like this would create mean that the two shouldn't ever go together; but so is giving the police battle tanks I guess. Utopian in look, a police state underneath, very interesting.

Sound - 9
The sound effects are not too great; as far as an anime with police tanks go (so its still cool XD), the English dubs are great and bring the emotions across and draws the characters to life. What really sets this anime apart in the sound department are the amazing opening and ending themes. The opening is a poundingly intense pop metal song (No those two usually don't go together), one of the best in its genre I've heard, beating out scores of western pop metal songs I've heard. The ending theme is a rather hauntingly beautiful ballard, attributable to the great vocalist. It playing through the final airport sequence is a perfect culmination for all the emotions, hardships and motivations of the entire series.

Character - 9
The characters are so loveable, each and every one of them; they are depicted well and perfectly compliment each other. Prior acquaintance with them however is preferable. Leona starts out as a fully fleshed out character, a hardened, made of steel veteran of the tank police force who's passion for her work is only surpassed by her love (and I mean love) for her tank. Her character is the driving force for the whole anime, filled to the brim with fiery passion and serious guts. Its good that they give her plenty of motivation too; revenge for her old partner's death. Is she too tough to like? No way! She's got plenty of vulnerabilities as well whether from her recklessness or the fear of losing her tank.
The supporting characters are also great but I've hit a word limit!

Enjoyment - 10
Police men with tanks; that very premise makes for some seriously entertaining stuff but add that with themes on excessive government control and megacorporations and great characters make this anime a must watch for cyberpunk, Shirow, police anime and retro action OVA fans alike.

PG for mild violence and coarse language

A more serious sequel - and not for the best. Unlike the original Dominion Tank Police which was an enjoyable farce, this one plays it more serious and comes out swinging ... like a typical nonsensical 90s action anime OVA.

Once again set in Newport City which, we are informed, has a murder every 30 seconds (which comes to about one million murders per year, I guess they have carpet bombings on Sundays or something) this installment of Tank Police has an ongoing plot involving generic nefarious dealings by a generic evil corporation, which was already cookie cutter at the time this was released. The ... action is passable and makes the whole video entertaining, although the wacky antics of the characters are copypasted from the farcial original and sometimes feel out of place in the supposedly more serious setting.
Being on a retro kick I did enjoy the action and I would have rated this higher if not for the last episode which is probably one of the worst cases of "wrap it up syndrome".

I have a feeling that this OAV wasn't a success and more or less doomed the franchise, given that other Shirow's properties from that time had much longer staying power.