Anime Review: Iria: Zeiram the Animation
What's this? Kat, watching anime before the semester's over? Shocking, I know. But this one was a short little six episode OVA, so I was able to binge it all at once.
Iria is one of those titles that I'd heard about back in the day, but I never had a chance to see it. I was poking around Netflix the other day, and lo and behold, there it was. So I decided to give it a whirl.
The character designs are pretty, but then, I like 90s anime. The music wasn't what I'd expected. Both the opening and ending themes were kind of slow and soulful...almost like something from BGC 2040, honestly. Not awful, but not my favorite, either. And I felt like there was less background music than is usual...there were a number of instances when I was surprised by the silence.
Being that it's only six episodes, the cast is understandably small. I liked Iria. Badass women are always favorites of mine. I also liked Bob and Glen, though we didn't see much of Glen, and only a bit more of Bob. Fujikoro is okay, I guess. He's a grumpy bastard who complains a lot, but I think he really does like Iria, for all his protestations to the contrary. The kids, Kei and Komimasa were obnoxious. Every time they'd do something a little sweet, they'd spoil it by being a little shit not 30 seconds later. I was honestly rooting for Iria to just shoot them in the second episode. =P
I'm not sure he counts as a character, exactly, but Zeiram...well. I honestly found him a little ridiculous. He's supposed to be this epic, terrifying monster...and his head looks like an upside down bowl. With a little Noh mask on it. =/ Yeah. Not exactly the stuff of nightmares. And even with the whole 'killing machine' thing, I felt that they almost...played it lightly? I'm not sure how to describe it. But I felt like there was relatively little blood and carnage for all the characters' supposed fear. I mean, sure, you shoot him and he keeps coming. That's scary. But that's about it. There was just nothing that was very intimidating about him, to me. Heck, some of the characters aren't even that scared! The 'administration' on Myce, when confronted by the Doctor about Zeiram, just blithely state that they'll just jettison him into space. Even knowing that it's a temporary solution, they say they'll just keep doing it over and over. So, yeah. Kinda hard to take him all that seriously.
Not only that, but we don't really know anything about him, either. What is Zeiram? An alien creature? (Which is kind of implied, but never really stated.) Or some kind of freaky science experiment? Also, how the heck did that corporation plan to use Zeiram? As a weapon, obviously, but how? The audio recording that Iria finds has the VP saying something like, 'even a child could control Zeiram'. But they never elaborate on that!
As for the story...it's a bit of a mess. Iria and her brother go on a job and encounter Zeiram, as the cargo they were sent to retrieve. Iria flees, while her brother stays behind to destroy the ship, and Zeiram on it. Iria lands on a crappy resort planet, meets the brats, and finds out Zeiram is alive. She makes it home, only to be attacked by assassins sent by the company that hired her to retrieve Zeiram in the first place. (This part was actually a bit interesting.) She finds out that the company had covered up the incident with her last job, including falsifying death records for her friend Bob and the VP that they rescued. She goes after the VP, who is in fact alive. She threatens to kill him, but doesn't. All she really accomplishes with that stunt is to retrieve Bob, who is now somehow a computer. Then we never see or hear of this guy, his company, or the conspiracy again. =/ Then it's just a lot of running around, fighting Zeiram and his clones. That's about it.
Oh, and speaking of Zeiram...that ending was a complete copout. I mean, sure. You figure the series will end with Iria finally killing Zeiram. But the way she does it...it defies belief. All she had to do was slice his little skinny, extendable neck? Seriously? What with all the serious firepower that gets launched at Zeiram, by the military and otherwise, are we really supposed to believe that no one else ever managed to hit that neck? And when he dies, there's no drama to it. He just falls over and turns to dust...extremely anti-climactic!
This is one of those series that I feel has some good things, but overall, it could have been a lot better. Iria is a great character, and the whole setting of this futuristic world with really neat technology and bounty hunters and everything is all rather appealing. They just really dropped the ball with Zeiram, and the story at large. They could have had a good story, if they'd done more with the whole conspiracy angle. That part was interesting! But they barely brushed against it, then moved on to more boring stuff. Plus, if Zeiram had actually been intimidating and scary, that would have helped enormously.
Final verdict? Meh. If you like mindless action and don't require a solid plot to back it up, then you'll like this one. But if you care more about the story, you'll likely be disappointed. The title character is cool, but she's not really enough to carry this series all by herself. Decent bones, but lackluster execution.
Iria is one of those titles that I'd heard about back in the day, but I never had a chance to see it. I was poking around Netflix the other day, and lo and behold, there it was. So I decided to give it a whirl.
The character designs are pretty, but then, I like 90s anime. The music wasn't what I'd expected. Both the opening and ending themes were kind of slow and soulful...almost like something from BGC 2040, honestly. Not awful, but not my favorite, either. And I felt like there was less background music than is usual...there were a number of instances when I was surprised by the silence.
Being that it's only six episodes, the cast is understandably small. I liked Iria. Badass women are always favorites of mine. I also liked Bob and Glen, though we didn't see much of Glen, and only a bit more of Bob. Fujikoro is okay, I guess. He's a grumpy bastard who complains a lot, but I think he really does like Iria, for all his protestations to the contrary. The kids, Kei and Komimasa were obnoxious. Every time they'd do something a little sweet, they'd spoil it by being a little shit not 30 seconds later. I was honestly rooting for Iria to just shoot them in the second episode. =P
I'm not sure he counts as a character, exactly, but Zeiram...well. I honestly found him a little ridiculous. He's supposed to be this epic, terrifying monster...and his head looks like an upside down bowl. With a little Noh mask on it. =/ Yeah. Not exactly the stuff of nightmares. And even with the whole 'killing machine' thing, I felt that they almost...played it lightly? I'm not sure how to describe it. But I felt like there was relatively little blood and carnage for all the characters' supposed fear. I mean, sure, you shoot him and he keeps coming. That's scary. But that's about it. There was just nothing that was very intimidating about him, to me. Heck, some of the characters aren't even that scared! The 'administration' on Myce, when confronted by the Doctor about Zeiram, just blithely state that they'll just jettison him into space. Even knowing that it's a temporary solution, they say they'll just keep doing it over and over. So, yeah. Kinda hard to take him all that seriously.
Not only that, but we don't really know anything about him, either. What is Zeiram? An alien creature? (Which is kind of implied, but never really stated.) Or some kind of freaky science experiment? Also, how the heck did that corporation plan to use Zeiram? As a weapon, obviously, but how? The audio recording that Iria finds has the VP saying something like, 'even a child could control Zeiram'. But they never elaborate on that!
As for the story...it's a bit of a mess. Iria and her brother go on a job and encounter Zeiram, as the cargo they were sent to retrieve. Iria flees, while her brother stays behind to destroy the ship, and Zeiram on it. Iria lands on a crappy resort planet, meets the brats, and finds out Zeiram is alive. She makes it home, only to be attacked by assassins sent by the company that hired her to retrieve Zeiram in the first place. (This part was actually a bit interesting.) She finds out that the company had covered up the incident with her last job, including falsifying death records for her friend Bob and the VP that they rescued. She goes after the VP, who is in fact alive. She threatens to kill him, but doesn't. All she really accomplishes with that stunt is to retrieve Bob, who is now somehow a computer. Then we never see or hear of this guy, his company, or the conspiracy again. =/ Then it's just a lot of running around, fighting Zeiram and his clones. That's about it.
Oh, and speaking of Zeiram...that ending was a complete copout. I mean, sure. You figure the series will end with Iria finally killing Zeiram. But the way she does it...it defies belief. All she had to do was slice his little skinny, extendable neck? Seriously? What with all the serious firepower that gets launched at Zeiram, by the military and otherwise, are we really supposed to believe that no one else ever managed to hit that neck? And when he dies, there's no drama to it. He just falls over and turns to dust...extremely anti-climactic!
This is one of those series that I feel has some good things, but overall, it could have been a lot better. Iria is a great character, and the whole setting of this futuristic world with really neat technology and bounty hunters and everything is all rather appealing. They just really dropped the ball with Zeiram, and the story at large. They could have had a good story, if they'd done more with the whole conspiracy angle. That part was interesting! But they barely brushed against it, then moved on to more boring stuff. Plus, if Zeiram had actually been intimidating and scary, that would have helped enormously.
Final verdict? Meh. If you like mindless action and don't require a solid plot to back it up, then you'll like this one. But if you care more about the story, you'll likely be disappointed. The title character is cool, but she's not really enough to carry this series all by herself. Decent bones, but lackluster execution.