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The Witch From Mercury Season 2 is a weak end to what could have been a great show. If I could sum up this show in two words it would be: Missed Opportunities and that really is a shame because this could have been great if Sunrise played their cards right and knew what to focus on, but they didn’t and now we’re stuck with this.

Now, season 1 wasn’t exactly amazing but it was an interesting first step into a new AU. The universe of Ad Stella is still one with plenty of potential and intrigue. A corporate hellscape where Earth is consumed by ... proxy wars, poverty and rampant human rights violations while the elite that live comfortably in space control basically everything with their monopolies on mobile suit development. While the first cour might have dragged its heels here and there, it also set up a lot of cool and interesting concepts and plot threads. Transhumanism, human experimentation, corporate backstabbing, proxy conflicts, etc, that were ripe to expand upon in the second act. But no, WFM drops the ball hardcore and what remains is a rushed, poorly paced mess with more hanging threads than a Goodwill sweater.

First off, the pacing. Season 1 was slow, almost to a fault. Nothing wrong with letting the story breathe and naturally going about things but this is no Turn A Gundam. Instead the story dragged as the lower stakes and constant back and forth between the factions quickly kept things at a standstill. While there were some good episodes here and there (Guel’s Pride, A Gloomy Song, Their Choice), It wasn’t until episode 12 that things really kicked into high gear, the stakes were dramatically raised and we ended on a classic Okouchi cliffhanger that left basically everyone desperate to see what happens next.

And then… this. Season 2 starts off strong if a bit messy. A franchise wide high (What They Wish For) is followed by an entire episode dedicated to bringing Guel back home and establishing the Dawn of Fold, their motives and the people working with them. Surely this will be useful later right? After that we get one more solid episode in Cycle of Sin before the ball is dropped and it is dropped hard. Presumably having realised that it’s been 17 episodes and they haven’t meaningfully developed their lead or really the story as a whole, the plot rushes into overdrive crashes from one plot point to the next. We get our SECOND fake-out breakup of the show, a bunch of poorly explained exposition dumps, several characters get locked together in a room as the plot doesn’t know what to do with them, Shaddiq’s plan fails and he gets owned to death by Guel because a child mentioned his nickname to the space police before it all smashes into a wall at mach 10 as a super powerful Gundam that had never been mentioned or even hinted at before in the plot is pulled out of thin air. After that, everyone rushes to the final destination, a space laser gets pulled out of thin air to raise the stakes, there’s a random and utterly pointless side fight between Guel and his eternally seething brother Lauda in the much hyped Schwarzette Gundam which ultimately does nothing whatsoever except job and then the whole thing hastily wraps things up as fast as humanly possible in a big glittery bow, using as much space magic and shallow writing as possible. The end, thanks for watching.

The main critical issue with the show lies entirely in its pacing (and by extension its writing). After a slow as molasses first cour, the writers realised that they had spent so long pussyfooting around that they need to get back on track pronto. This ends up damaging the show significantly as any further character development from the leads is sidelined or hastily ran over, plot twists happen but ultimately serve little purpose (the reveal that the Space Assembly League, an organisation we still don’t know much about, is allied with the remnants of Ochs Earth from the Prologue is meant to be a shocking turn of events but that goes nowhere and is quickly dealt with the exact same scene it’s introduced), etc etc. They clearly wanted to make the finale a big thing even though that itself is filled with out-of-nowhere reveals, pointless and frankly stupid detours and a last episode that devolves into complete nonsense before coming to an abrupt close. Peil’s human experimentation? Never mentioned again. The Dawn of Fold? Ultimately pointless. Elan Ceres’ motivation and reason for being in the story (and by extent the histories of Enhanced Person 4 and 5?) Who cares. Instead Suletta goes EVEN FURTHER BEYOND, erases all the Gundams and then we get a brief three year time skip that is over and done with in a few minutes where everything is hunky dory even though the world is still on the brink of social collapse. But hey, at least the leads are happy right?

The biggest issue here is regarding Prospera. After spending the whole show pulling strings, murdering people, manipulating those around her, launching a false flag attack on Earth and building what is essentially a giant EMP space station that will let her control all technology in the Earth Sphere, her plan crumbles after a group of teenagers back into her Death Star using biometric data of a tomato (yes I’m serious) and then she is instantly forgiven for her sins and dodges any form of punishment whatsoever, as Suletta just really wants a mom. Instead, Shaddiq decides to take the blame for it because reasons. The worst part is that this directly goes against the very themes the show was establishing in the previous episodes. Take responsibility for your actions, children shouldn’t suffer because of what their parents do, etc. Well fuck that I guess because none of the adults take responsibility for their actions and their crimes are either ignored or forgotten about as Shaddiq bares the brunt of the law himself, smiling away as he’s carted off to his trial. Additionally the 4 CEOs of Peil, who the show seemed to be setting up as the final villains alongside the Space Assembly League get off completely scott-free for their crimes (minus losing their assets) and get to spend their days in a senior citizen’s home, their human trafficking and experimentation projects conveniently forgotten about.

Another glaring issue is the main relationship between Suletta and Miroine, or lack thereof. Sure the show will tell you that they’ve fallen in love and deeply care about one another but it certainly doesn’t show it. They shared maybe one genuinely romantic scene in the entire show and that was back in season 1. Take a look at their scenes together and pick out any actual romantic parts you see. Not vague or ambiguous stuff. Genuine romance. Try and also pick out a romantic scene that isn’t layered in exposition or lore dumps. Go on, try it. You’ll get… absolutely nothing. Season 2 doesn’t make things any better considering they barely interact at all, bar maybe a grand total of 3 times altogether throughout these 12 episodes. Now I know the people who are only watching this for the girls and don’t care about anything else will eat up whatever slop is dropped on their plate but if you’re looking for a genuinely well written romance story, you’re not going to find it here. Similarly you’re not going to find much mecha action here, any good political drama or much character development outside of the main pair either, meaning this show has failed on the base level and appeals to basically no one. Good job there, Sunrise

Now what did I like? Well there’s some cool mech designs (even if some are disgustingly underused), I like the overall setting and the world, Miorine is a solid character as is Guel and the Elan trio were definitely entertaining to watch, as was Kenanji and Martin. Suletta also gets some solid development; even if it takes nearly the whole run to start it. Everything else? I couldn’t tell you even if I tried. The music is bland and forgettable outside of the two excellent opening themes, character designs are iffy and the quality animation varies dramatically.

I’m not mad, I’m not even disappointed, I’m just tired. It’s been nearly 20 years since 00 came out and since then, most of the high quality Gundam we’ve been getting has been from movies and OVAs (mainly Hathaway and Thunderbolt) with the inbetween shows ranging from fun but flawed (G-Reco), boring as sin (AGE) or entire trainwrecks of their own (IBO). In the end it’s my fault for getting excited as I probably should’ve seen the warning signs going in (Okouchi writing, aimed at a wider audience, newbie director). But c’est la vie I guess, there’s always next time.

With a name like ‘Battle Royal High School’, I can assume you’ve already made up your mind on what this OVA is going to be about. Perhaps a bog standard martial arts tournament anime? A game of death styled fight for survival? Maybe even a sports show? Well, it’s none of those things. Battle Royal High School is too good for such a label. Instead, it’s a completely different beast. Something so indescribably nuts that it defies common sense, logic and coherency in favour of pure unhinged chaos.

The story starts off in typical cliched fashion. Riki Hyoudo is your average high school martial artist ... who loves to fight. We first meet him as he beats down the karate club captain and proclaims his desire to take on every master in Japan and then the world in his quest for greatness. Standard stuff, nothing you haven’t seen a million times before. Meanwhile, in the demon realm, the dark lord Byoudo is informed that the “Gate of Light” has opened and that his dark energy is being siphoned into another dimension to create an ultimate warrior. Knowing he cannot take over the human world without defeating this being, Byoudo enters our realm to find him and settle things in a fight. After confronting Riki and realising that he is his light world counterpart, Byoudo fuses with the boy intending to absorb his power into himself. It doesn’t go to plan and instead Riki ends up with the Dark Lord becoming part of him, gaining all his powers and having him as a separate conscience in his head. Then, all hell breaks lose.

What follows is 50 minutes of sheer unfiltered madness. Demon slayers, psychic combat, the space-time continuum police, giant killer teddy bears, evil fairies and a whole heaping of blood and guts all await you in this flaming slice of 80s nonsense. It’s safe to say that BRHS’ plot really doesn’t matter. This is a show that throws you in headfirst and tells you to enjoy the ride. Thinking about things too hard is going to get you nowhere, just sit back and enjoy the carnage in all of its bloody, over the top glory. Nowhere else will you see a time cop fight a giant killer demon teddy bear before turning into a Space Sheriff-esq Tokusatsu hero and using a light saber to kill it. Try and name another anime that has a man use a manhole cover as a boomerang to take out a flying demon fairy cat. You can’t, and that’s what makes this shit so goddamned beautiful. It’s an exercise in being as unhinged and as cool as possible, and it works to staggering effect.

Despite being a (presumably) low budget OVA from a period full of poorly animated shlock, BRHS manages to be one of the most detailed, fluid and visually impressive works of the era (on a side note, a young Hideaki Anno of Gainax fame was an animator on the project). The gore is messy, brutal and immaculately drawn. Fight scenes are fast and frantic with a massive amount of detail going into environment damage and movement. Demon designs are fittingly gnarly and otherworldly and characters are expressive and well animated. One scene in particular is of such note that I had to bring it up, featuring a human body being rebuilt from scraps of flesh and gore. What could have been cheaply animated and depicted off screen is instead rendered in extreme detail, with a freakily medically accurate depiction of the inner workings of the body: skeleton, guts, muscles, tendons and all. For a release as low brow and nutty as this, it’s kind of really impressive (and a bit concerning) that they went to such detail not only being as accurate as possible but animating it so smoothly. It’s understandable really, as BRHS was directed by one of the madmen of animation at the time: Ichirō Itano, a man who cut his teeth working under Yoshikazu Yasuhiko before making his big break directing episodes of Macross (which introduced the world to his unique style of animating and directing, notably the famed ‘Itano Circus’) before taking the reigns on several pieces of cult classic filth from the 80s and 90s like Angel Cop (which also features really really detailed gore) and Violence Jack (just Evil Town, y’know the really fucking violent and disturbing one?). BRHS was his first time writing the screenplay instead of just directing, and for a first attempt at scripting something, he does an admirable job. Sure, condensing a 4 volume manga (sorry, forgot to mention that it’s an adaption) into an hour is a high task and it can definitely be a bit break neck at times with the amount of concepts and characters it throws at you, but really that’s what makes the OVA even more enjoyable. It stops for no one. Things barely need to be explained, they just need to be experienced. A lesser writer/director would’ve probably spent a good few minutes establishing who the hell the Time-Space Continuum police were and why they even existed but who gives a fuck when there’s demons to be murdered and shit to blow up?

Voice acting is strong on both ends. The sub features Kazuki Yao, fresh off Gundam ZZ, as both Riki and Byoudo, giving the hot blooded fighter a lot of wit, snark and even a foreboding presence. Chieko Honda, god rest her soul, gives the character of Megumi a lot of tender and cute charm (ironically she was also in Gundam ZZ as Ple, I swear I’m not trying to bring everything back to Gundam; it’s just a weird coincidence) and veterans Kazuhiko Inoue and Hideyuki Tanaka provide solid voices for demon slayer Toshihiro and space cop Zankan respectively. On the English side, Animego lay down a fittingly cheesy and dated but still charming and enjoyable dub, featuring a cast mainly of unknowns who do a solid job with the material given, mainly Michael Granberry (who voices not just Riki and Byoudo but Toshihiro too) and Susan Grillo as Riki’s snarky, hot headed friend Ryuoko. It’s hardly Shakespearean stuff, but the cheese laden dialogue and performances fit the show’s batshit tone well.

Musically… look, of course it’s going to be good. Shiro Sagisu, best known for his work on Evangelion and Bleach handles the soundtrack and fills it with fittingly hot blooded, screaming 80s J-Rock, ominous synth pieces and grandiose symphonic tracks (he also did the music for Megazone 23 which Itano partly directed. It all comes together!). It fits like a glove; and the closing credits track ‘Medusa’ is a killer hunk of cheesy 80s hair metal, well worth a listen on its own outside of watching the OVA.

It’s almost baffling at how everything comes together so well here. Awesome animation, an awesome soundtrack, awesome fight scenes. Why is this shit so good? I came in expecting a goofy cheap gorefest and instead I got handed one of the most entertaining and visually dazzling OVAs of the 80s. This should not work as well as it does, in fact it should have been a total disaster given the short runtime, complicated setup and lack of a followup, but things work out so well that’s it’s almost a miracle. And what a miracle it is. I can’t recommend this shit enough, if you like fighting anime: watch it. If you like horror anime, watch it. If you like to have your nuts blown off with insanely good animation and a rocking soundtrack, watch it. Just watch it and be enlightened. There’s few anime that can provide such entertainment as Battle Royal High School. Sadly, this seems to not be too warmly received on this site, but I understand. Some people can’t appreciate pure fun kino. Don’t worry, you’ll come around eventually.

Put out the fire.


The OVA boom was an important milestone in the anime industry. No longer were creators stifled by network demands, sponsors or even dedication to long form series. Basically any studio could put out whatever they wanted, be it a collection of anime music videos, ultra violent martial arts shorts or even hardcore pornography. It was really the Wild West in terms of what was being made and anyone with half a budget and a couple of animators could really do what they wanted, provided they got a distribution deal. While this boom did give us veritable classics like ‘Bubblegum Crisis’, ‘Appleseed’, ... ‘Gunbuster’ and ‘Angel’s Egg’, it also spawned a tidal wave of schlocky lowbrow trash that became synonymous with the early anime scene in the west in the 90s. Masterpieces of filth like ‘Urotsukidoji’, ‘Mad Bull 34’ and ‘Violence Jack’ reigned supreme; and people ate it up. From the pits of obscurity, comes today’s feature: a 50 minute OVA named ‘Blue Flames’, based off a manga by the same name. It’s hard to really class this thing in all honesty. Is it a drama? A thriller? Hentai? One big bizarre joke at the cost of the audience? Let’s take a gander and see what these flames have to offer

Ryuuichi Kaizu is an ambitious man. On the surface, he’s a quiet, academic student with good looks and a calm domineer. But underneath the mask is something far more twisted and unpredictable. Kaizu, you see, is a monster. A cold, calculating man who will use everyone around him to get what he wants. The story isn’t exactly rich and complicated. We first get a glimpse of Kaizu’s actual nature failure early on. Upon being accosted by two bullies, he offers to pay them off instead of getting his shit caved in. He gets the ¥100,000 needed by going to his favourite hostess and just asking her for the money. Eventually he hitches up with the school’s resident rich girl Emi, where he promptly solicits money out of her angry father who wants the two to break up and then quickly moves on, completely uncaring after she tries to kill herself over the break-up.

After this point, the plot sort of repeats itself a little, though this time Kaizu becomes a man obsessed. After moving to Tokyo with his hooker girlfriend, the man goes on a fuck quest, plowing everyone he sees, getting tennis lessons purely to best the college’s team captain and becoming a host at a disco club, where his escapades for poon reach new heights. After his girlfriend questions him about this, he goes to walk out and then flat out calls her his slave. Then he rapes her at which point she instantly submits to him. What the fuck? The anime comes to an anticlimactic finish when Kaizu shacks up with another girl, another rich daughter and continues his quest to rule Japan, regardless of what it takes. It kinda just stops. Given how this is based off a manga (which I haven’t and can’t read because Japanese language is hard), I assume, I HOPE that Kaizu gets his comeuppance at the end of his story. That someone shoots him after he rises to the top, or he dies lonely and bitter. Anything!

And that’s Kaizu. He’s a manipulative, misogynistic rapist scumbag who uses everyone around him for personal gain, sex and monetary compensation. I think it’s fair to say that he’s one of the most thoroughly unlikable main characters perhaps in any medium, and there was not a single moment in this anime that I rooted for him and wanted to see him win (well, the tennis match I guess, but that’s because most of the team he plays against are as shallow and cruel as he is). Everyone around him seems oblivious to the scope of Kaizu’s malice, except maybe his father who clearly dislikes the boy and fellow student Kirioka, one of the few likeable characters here, who beats the shit out of him for being so uncaring about Emi’s suicide attempt (but even then this was all a ploy by Kaizu to get Kirioka’s scholarship suspended for fighting). Everyone else is either aggressively shallow, stupid or cruel. What a wonderful world, eh?


Animation wise, it’s nothing special. In fact it’s nothing even really notable either. Character designs are by the numbers, the animation is fine but occasionally stiff and awkward and facial expressions frequently dip into bizarro territory. The music is nothing special either (I believe some of it may be stock given the harpsichord piece that plays at one point that I’ve heard several times before, but I’m not too sure). It’s just another typical bland low budget OVA from the 80s that would’ve completely passed the world by if it wasn’t for the absolutely heinous lead character.


I think it’s kinda hard to write about an anime like ‘Blue Flames’, mainly because I have no idea what it’s trying to do. Is it being too generous to suggest that it’s meant to be a look into a character so reprehensible and evil that you could never possibly root for him? Is this some form of satire, beating ‘School Days’ to the punch by a good 20 years? Is it just a very awful, very cruel wish fulfilment anime aimed at misogynists and the meek who wish to see an “underdog” get his way? Whatever it is, ‘Blue Flames’ succeeds in one major way. Making the biggest bastard of a character imaginable. It’s hard to recommend you watch this, mainly because it’ll probably just succeed in making you angry or upset. I will say though, there were times I physically laughed out loud at just how comically evil Kaizu is, like how he thinks about Emi in her hospital bed while he fucks his hostess girlfriend. I’d say this is worth a watch if you’re willing to see another prime example of the shallow schlock that crawled out of the animation industry in the 80s as the OVA boom really took hold or if you just want a good laugh, but nothing more than that. You deserve better. We all do.

Apocalypse Zero is a 1994 manga by Takayuki Yamaguchi. You might recognise that name, as he’s also the creator of Shigurui (Death Frenzy), a highly acclaimed, highly violent historical action drama about two swordsman in Edo period Japan. Apocalypse was his first big break and his first work that achieved popularity. It’s interesting to observe the sheer difference in opinions on Apocalypse Zero in the West and Japan. Apocalypse (or more accurately it’s animated adaption) is widely reviled in the anime community, with those that have seen it often have little positive to say about it. In Japan, the series was acclaimed enough to be ... a nominated finalist for the Osamu Tezuka Cultural Prize (which is basically the manga equivalent of the oscars). Hell, most people in English speaking territories aren’t even aware Apocalypse started as a manga. In fairness, the hate is somewhat justified. The OVA adaption of Apocalypse Zero ran for just two episodes out of a planned ten before it was abruptly cancelled, so all that was really showcased of the story was the absolutely psychotic first three volumes, which is where the series gets most of its infamy from.

Let’s start from the top. Apocalypse Zero is known for its absolutely nutty imagery, but the story is equally deranged. In WW2, an imperial scientist named Shiro Hagakure became development on a project that would surely win the war for Japan. Using various human experiments, he developed the Fortified Armor Shells, pieces of combat armor that increase strength, speed and foresight into the wearer as well as protecting them to an absurd degree. As it turns out, the armors have been encased with the 3000 souls of those used in the experiments, powering the armors themselves. The war was lost however, and Shiro died a war criminal. The armors lived on though, passed down from generation to generation until they land in the hands of Kakugo Hagekure and his brother Harara. Instead of using the armors to bring about pain, misery and domination as intended, their father trains them both in the school of Zero Form Defense (also developed by Shiro), a special type of martial arts training that strengthens their bodies to extreme levels, in the hope they will use the armors and strength to protect the weak. Eventually, the world gets destroyed by a series of disasters that leave everything in ruins. Mutated monsters start springing up all over the place and living is pretty hard for the surviving populace. Kakugo vows to protect the innocent from the horrors of the new world, whereas Harara betrays his father’s teachings and intends to wipe out humanity, using an army of mutated monsters and warlords as his source. The two come into conflict with each other and… things start getting weird. Eventually Kakugo winds up in Neo Tokyo, coincidentally the same place where Harara’s castle base is, where he enrols in a school. There he makes friends, fights off monsters sent by Harara and wracks up an extremely impressive body count, all while donning the Zero armor and frequently interacting with the hive mind of POW war experiments housed within. It’s pretty kooky.

As it stands in its unfinished state, Apocalypse Zero is a mishmash of utter chaos, full of extreme gore and repulsive imagery and heavy on shock factor. Unfortunately, it never got the chance to be more than that. The original manga begins similarly, with the first several chapters being little more than increasingly bizarre and violent fights against an array of disgusting looking monsters. Around the 4th volume though, the series takes a sudden turn and begins weirdly engaging and enjoyable. The focus on shocking imagery and bizarre scenarios slowly fades away, until we’re left with an oddly gripping and rather tender plot. Granted, it’s an extremely basic good vs evil story, and the horrific designs and boatloads of gore never go away, but an actual tenable plot is established, and the once flat and one note characters have a chance to grow and develop. Kakugo is little more than a stoic killing machine in the anime, but in the pages of the manga, his character is much more than that, and his struggle to balance his duty as the wearer of the Zero armor and his love for the friends he makes becomes a massive conflict he must overcome. Horie, the series’ main girl is little more than a ray of sunshine who swoons after Kakugo in the anime, whereas in the manga, she struggles with her own self image and dependence on herself. They’re not massively complex motivations and backgrounds, but they’re still there and they’re still appreciated. But Apocalypse Zero the anime never tackles the scenes that make Apocalypse Zero the manga such an enjoyable and surprisingly good read. So what we get is a combined 90 minutes of sheer chaos with some of the most vile imagery you’ll likely ever find in an animated release. But really, that’s what makes it so fun. The anime and manga couldn’t be further apart. One balances surrealism, carnage and character into an enjoyable and supremely well drawn story. The anime revels in its own filth and is content in being appropriately foul. And that’s okay. It’s batshit insane and it knows it, barely holding together a plot amidst the background of gore, sex and death. It’s perfect ‘turn off your brain and just marvel at the chaos’ material, though you’ll probably need a barf bag or two just to get through most of it. Nowhere else can you witness a woman hickey a man’s face off and then use it as a nipple pastie. You won’t find another anime that has a decrepit old man use his own fortified spit as ammunition and then turn his penis into a sentient dragon that shoots weaponised jizz. No other anime displays mutant nurses that use their massive Z cup boobs as missiles. You will never EVER see another show that has the main character fist fight a mutant bear with six massive titties and acidic blood in the first MINUTE. It’s Kamen Rider, Fist of the North Star, Parasyte, Berserk, Riki-Oh, Urotsukidoji and Kekko Kamen all rolled into one horrifying psychotic package that crosses the line so many times; it should win an award. Good taste and decency are foreign concepts to Apocalypse Zero, and you will know true horror when you witness its putrid depths. It’s a masterpiece of unashamed, all knowing filth that just so happens to be the first part of a much larger and much more engrossing plot. Turn off your mind and behold its madness, you’ll never seen anything else like it.