Introduction that you can skip if you just want the anime review.
So I’ve received some interesting responses to a few prior blog posts I made over the years. In particular, posts I made regarding the holocaust and pedophilia (if you want a taste of both, go play Barbarossa). The type of responses I do not allow to be published publicly on this website. Not that I can’t handle criticism, but because this isn’t exactly criticism I’m dealing with here. It’s just straight up, flat-out, insults and borderline death threats. Anyone who has read the About page on this site would know I only allow insults and death threats if, and only if, there’s some constructive criticism, or solid arguments making a sturdy case for their position while attacking my own, to go along with them.
Comments like, “Why don’t you kill yourself and make the world a better place?” Well, for starters, you’re 20 years too late asking that of me, as I’m not as impressionable as I used to be. You can also watch Suicide Club for thoughts on suicide. But really, the reason why I’m not going to do it because you touch yourself at night.
Or this comment, “This is not acceptable, and I’m French!” Well, I may have actually allowed that comment to go through if he had mentioned that France set the age of consent to 15 in 2021, which would give him some justification on being an authority figure on this subject with better understanding and qualifications than I do. Guess I need to watch more French films, drink more wine, and eat more cheese (not American cheese, because that shouldn’t even be considered cheese as any reasonable person would understand it).
But one of the best comments I didn’t let through that I’ve seen, “Now I know there isn’t a God, otherwise he would’ve had you killed by now.” Well maybe you’re following the wrong religion that gives you the wrong idea about God. For all we know, heaven is run by a supernatural computer system operated by harem angels who, every once in a while, come down to Earth answering not our prayers but our phone calls, and offer to grant us one wish. From what I hear, they only do this for good-natured people; as in those who won’t use their wish to ask for the death/destruction/genocide of a people or person. Which pretty much leaves hypocrites like you out of the loop.
So I’ve been thinking about just doing a simple review response to those who wish me dead by offering an anime review that depicts the afterlife in a positive way. Might dissuade the haters from wanting me to get to the afterlife so quickly (though if my vision/message I received from those in the afterlife is accurate, I have enough time left to make a few more haters lose their faith while they wait for my demise). You know, one of those reviews to do partially out of spite.
At the same time, I’ve grown weary of being the usual trash-talking, borderline trolling, anger-inducing S.O.B. that I have been since the beginning. The whole point of me doing that showboating schtick was to induce those of opposing views to hit back with a solid argument littered with as many facts as insults demonstrating objectively why my position is wrong, and telling me to “suck it” for the cherry on top. Deliberately taking a position supporting a controversial position primarily just to see what arguments could be made against it. Because surely if the position goes against the status quo, there would be some very very good arguments that support the status quo (thus demonstrating there is a good reason why it is the status quo), which at the same time tear my position to shreds. The point being to have these arguments maintained and preserved on this site for reference, so that others who ask the same questions I do, wondering why things are the way things are, will have in-depth answers that will sate their curiosity. It used to work rather effectively in the past. But times are changing, less people think critically, many aren’t intelligent enough to read between the lines or tell when I’m being a smart-ass or deliberately over-the-top. It’s just not that fun anymore, in spite of how amusing some of these responses can be. But I want more than amusement. I want a mental challenge (ie the kind for smart people, not for the mentally challenged; I’m trying not to be retarded here).
So I was going to do this review in a more straightforward way after this introduction, until I heard the news that Japan is probably going to pass this law making penalties for “insults” much more harsh. Apparently, you can get fined thousands of dollars and spend up to a year in prison for insulting someone in Japan. Well fuck that, and fuck the people who came up with that law, bunch of low-life pussies, gook-faces, fishheads, and eggroll politicians/lawyers incapable of standing up to bullies and coming up with witty comebacks, they go the pansy-ass lawyer route and want to force the silence of opposition, killing what little fun remains in the world. What the fuck happened to these people, did they just decide one day they’re never getting laid and want everyone else to suffer for it? They used to have anime that was politically incorrect as fuck. If this keeps up, they won’t be able to do satire anymore (at least not good satire). They’re going to fall culturally as hard as the United States has. Then again, MGTOW members like Turd Flinging Monkey (TFM) saw this coming ever since the U.S. forced pro-feminism laws into Japan ever since kicking their ass in WWII. Not one of the events I can be proud of my country for (among many). Either way, maybe a return to form is needed here for this occasion.
Many like me wish the government, and the world, was a better place. A place where there was a little more freedom, a little more creativity, and a little less overbearing authority and laws. You know, like the 80s and 90s (in spite of certain events prior to and during those decades). We’re living in a time where the best we can offer our children is relics of the past, showing how good we had it; how we behaved back then; what values we had, and what they should have; and explain why they don’t have them anymore, and why they won’t ever have them during their lifetime. Best we can hope for is helping them to usher in a better era. One that can churn out entertainment that’s on a respectable level of quality on a consistent and regular basis that becomes so frequent that they might make the mistake we did and take for granted more like it will keep coming for the rest of their lives. Anime like this one:
Oh! / Ah! My Goddess! (1993, 2005) Thoughts on the OVA and Series
The OVA Oh! My Goddess! (sometimes called Ah!, but it’s primarily referred to as Oh! to distinguish it from the longer-running anime series that isn’t OVA) is perfect for those wanting the anime girlfriend/harem experience in a similar manner that Tenchi Muyo: Ryo-Ohki is (except the former has more emphasis on “girlfriend,” the latter has more emphasis on “harem”). Short and sweet and only 5 episodes, very little padding and bullshit. Which is the complete opposite experience with the televised version Ah! My Goddess! (2005). 26 episodes, loads of padding and filler. The kind that tends to annoy the shit out of me.
Here’s how quickly the 5 episode OVA goes. Each of the first 3 episodes focuses on one of the goddesses being brought to Earth. Episode 1 is Belldandy, the main love interest for the typical male protagonist for shows like these. Episode 2 and 3 bring in a goddess who is related to Belldandy somehow. And then episodes 4-5 do the typical last act shtick where things get more serious, some plot contrivances and other bullshit supernatural stuff gets brought in to raise the stakes and emotions to make the viewer go, “Will they overcome this obstacle? Will they remain together and in love? Oh the humanity!” It’s eye-rolling, but I can’t be angry at it. Why? Because it’s a perfect way to encapsulate this OVA as being a condensed version of every romance/harem anime ever made. If you watch this show, you’ve pretty much seen the pattern of all those series. All anime of this genre follows the exact same beats and patterns, it’s just a matter of how much they want to draw it out.
And that’s exactly what the series Ah! My Goddess does. Same as the OVA, but much longer with every single scene and subplot drawn out excruciatingly longer. And I just couldn’t stick with it, for a number of reasons. For one thing, most of the stuff this version does the OVA does better. The first 5 episodes or so are basically the entire first episode of the OVA. By the end of the OVA’s first episode, it has this really nice moment where the male protagonist, Keiichi (I hate spelling that name), manages to man-up and make a move on Belldandy. No, it’s not kissing or feeling her up or anything like that; the show is too innocent for something like that (aside from the Urd goddess, more on her later). What happens is that they’re both sitting outside looking at the stars, and Keiichi makes a strong effort to show some form of affection by wrapping his arm around her shoulders, which surprises Belldandy for a moment, but this sign of affection makes her happy and she rests her head on his shoulders. It’s such a sweet moment that got to me, and a really great way to end the first episode. While something like this may happen in the actual televised series, it takes way too fucking long for it to happen.
For another thing, the televised series does 2 things differently from the OVA that really pissed me off. In the OVA, when Keiichi makes his one wish for the goddess Belldandy to grant, he wishes for her to be his girlfriend. As opposed to the series where his wish is, “I want you to always be by my side.” That just didn’t work as well for me, and it lacks the desire for intimacy with another individual that the OVA had with it’s more simple and straightforward request. Not to mention that he can clearly see there’s something supernatural about her prior to making his wish, while in the OVA I can see how he might still think this is some kind of prank.
But that’s not the worst thing. The worst thing is this stupid fucking concept of Heaven forcing the request to be maintained by any means necessary. In other words, if something would happen that would cause them to be potentially separated or broken up (it’s very inconsistent about what these standards are), it will force things to happen in a manner similar to Death causing things to happen to get people killed in those Final Destination movies. Whether it’s causing natural disasters, or getting a group of people to interject in a conveniently timed manner, or causing light poles to collapse or earthquakes or some shit like that. I fucking hated this concept with a fiery passion. This is what killed the show for me. 3 episodes in, and I was fucking done. I forced myself to go for a few episodes more strictly because I wanted to see how Urd is portrayed in it compared to the OVA (more on that later).
That being said, there are some things I liked about the series that I wish the OVA had in it. In episode 2 of the series, Belldandy notes that Keiichi is chosen by the Goddess Help-Line (yeah, I know) because of his qualities he has as a person. How he continually has a run of bad luck constantly throughout his life, is always mistreated by others who never appreciate the hard work he does. And yet he always carries on without getting too dismayed, always having hope for a bright future. An admirable character trait that is brought up again in a later episode when the “popular girl” of the school tries making moves on him, and the speech he gives to her near the end of the episode. This sort of thing makes my eyes water. It’s extremely rare for an anime to pull off this kind of character who is a schmuck with a heart of gold, because more often than not they make him too much of a dufus. It helps that the awkward situations he gets into primarily happens through no fault of his own, but through circumstances not entirely within his control as if he’s cursed to live this way. But making him into the good-natured optimist who bears it, really helps towards making him an inspirational role-model. It’s just too bad the series is marred by a lot of other bullshit I find intolerable.
Anyway, now for the Urd character, Belldandy’s big sister. I fucking love this character in the OVA (she shows up in episode 2). It’s not just because she’s the expected archetype of being the horny girl who acts as a cocktease all the time. No, it’s because of the voice actress dubbing her. Lanelle Markgraf. She is having too much fun with voicing this character, and it shows. Every line of dialogue she spouts, she’s walking this line of being serious and being over-the-top, and usually leaning more towards the latter often enough to let on that she knows this isn’t an anime you can take seriously (and it isn’t). It’s impossible for me to describe unless you listen to her for yourself. She single-handedly won me over to the OVA. I could listen to her talk like that all day (though to be fair, when scenes got more serious during the last two episodes, she reeled it in a bit).
This is the reason why I stuck around for a few more episodes longer than I would have otherwise with the television series. I wanted to stick around long enough for her character to show up. I wanted to see if the new voice actress could rival that magnificent performance of the OVA. Long story short, she couldn’t. It’s no fault of her own, honestly. The television series takes itself more seriously, and so do the English dubbers, and I can’t fault them for that. The English dub for Urd in the OVA is an anomaly makes it a borderline timeless classic for me.
Plus… I mean… how can you not love the idea of Urd. Some goddess chick who loves her sister Belldandy so much, that she’s willing to help her to-be boyfriend Keiichi be a man, and try to make sure she gets laid by him. Just the theoretical conversation/speech she must be having in her head over all this, while she’s trying to make Keiichi give-in to his inner horndog.
Now come on, grab my breast. Do it like this. Good, now I want you to go over to my sister, and grab her tits just like that. You don’t even need to grip them as firmly as you did mine, we both know she’s a virgin. But then I want you to be more firm with her. Be a man. Rip her clothes off and take her from behind. Pull on her hair. Make her moan with a pleasure so fierce it would make me cum just from watching it. Do it! Oh! Ah! Oh! Ah!
At the complete opposite of the spectrum is the other sister. The dreaded Skuld. The character who takes on the unfortunate archetype of being the annoying little brat I wanted to see thrown beneath a running lawnmower. The girl who is jealous of Keiichi taking Belldandy away from her, leaving her without her favorite sister. To be fair, she’s not the most annoying character I’ve seen in this kind of role, but characters like this are never fun for me in any anime series. And again, I can’t be entirely angry at this, because it’s such a short OVA (5 episodes) and she seems to be in there as a condensed version of what you would expect in a longer running series. I don’t even want to think about how irritating she could be in a 26 episode series. Besides, once you get past episode 3, she becomes more tolerable.
I’ll take the OVA over the series anyday. It does away with all the padding that tends to drive me nuts in shows like this, and also removes all that nonsense regarding a heavenly force forcing things on Earth to adhere to certain rules one way or another.
OVA rating: 3.5 / 5
Series rating: 2.5 / 5
Ah! My Goddess! The Movie (2000)
Don’t tell me it’s got a magical decompositioning program!?
All that made up techno spiritual gobbledeegook that I rolled my eyes at in the last two episodes of the OVA. Yeah, that’s pretty much this entire movie. Just making up shit every 10 minutes about how the heavenly computer systems work, just makes me think back on episodes of CSI (among other shows) that spout out techno babble while having no idea what they’re talking about, but trying to make it sound exciting and cool and smart. Except this comes along with a lot of the typical blunt philosophical preaching that tends to come with anime movies. If that’s your kind of thing, plus with more action than normal, then you’ll probably enjoy this film.
If there’s anything worthwhile that this film has to offer, it’s that Urd kisses Belldandy on the lips, and gives her some tongue too. Granted, I’m cherrypicking here, as there was a practical reason for it regarding exchanging fluids. But this movie is ridiculous, though a bit on the fun side of ridiculous. All this stuff that happens, mixed in with the power of love. Plus everything turns out alright for everyone, including the antagonist, in spite of almost annihilating everyone.
Movie rating: 2.5 / 5
The Anomalous Host 