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Debutante Detective Corps.
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Title Info
- alias: Ojosama Sosamo
- seen: 1 of 1
- type: OAV
- grade: flawed
- genre: dumb_fun
- made: unknown
- Review created: Recently, but I didn't record the date.
- mod: none
A movies which has the same degree of character and depth as JaJa Uma Quartet. Which is to say none at all. The story begins with the introduction of 5 attractive and curvacious girls to a private girls school. The fact that this introduction is by way of crashing into the hall ( possibly with the addition of running over the principal ) in increasingly improbable vehicular displays makes it clear that any attempt at subtlety has been dismissed. In short order we are told that these women are stupendously wealthy and as they fight it out with the baddies we get to see that they all have near magical talents. The action gets wilder and sillier as the show progresses until, with school destroyed, one of the women suggests that it is the perfect foundation for a school detectives club.
What can you say about a show like this? It must have seemed like a good idea at the production meetings. The girls have the correctly improper proportions and `archetypal' personalities and powers (made obvious by displaying a `character sheet' with their stats on each entry) required. They have amazing powers which can be used for detectiving, such as electronic, disguise, combat, weaponry and psychic skills (oops, gave all the characters away). And the action is suitably loud and over the top to keep the feeble of attention entertained. I guess the problem is that even making a dumb fun show actually takes a degree of skill to blend all the elements. And this show lets the action get too silly, the characters too shallow and the humor too flat to actually make the experience worthwhile. It's just loud, messy and meaningless. You would really have to be in the mood for simply sitting back and zoning out to get much enjoyment out of this.
This lack of attention is also to be seen in the animation. It's both fairly formula in appearance while being fairly sloppy. The design of the characters and the environments are both simple and lacking. The animation has energy, but no logic and precious little cool. The perfect dumb-fun show works because, although we know it is completely unreal and improbable, it is so cool, and epic and fun that we are willing to go with it. By comparison this simply looks unattractive, lazy and messy. I'll be very interested to see if this, which seems obviously intended as the pilot for a series, was a success in that task.
The fine folks at THEM could obviously acheive the needed mood, as they enjoyed it as seen in this review. On the other hand they make it clear that it must be seen as lightweight fun, and I disagree with them as to the animation quality. Still, at least they could confirm it is a one shot, so I need never fear a sequel. However the Anime Critic is less impressed in this review (although he did like the box). He identifies that the lack of story and character makes the action meaningless, and thus the whole experience quite unimpressive.
Words by Andrew Shelton, Web by Ticti, Last Compile: Wed Aug 5 12:39:17 WST 2009