Blood Reign: Curse Of The Youma ADV 77 minutes English/Japanese English Subtitles 01/30/2000

Back To B Listings

 

There's nothing worse than when something starts out with such huge promise and goes absolutely nowhere. Currently I'm working a job at the illustrious University of Pennsylvania that has yet to pay me for my three weeks of work. In fact, due to various problems that involves me losing two separate bosses copy cards on two separate occasions I'm now down three dollars. That's right, working at University of Penn has cost me the price of a dollar a week, is that not absolutely insane? I mean, think about it. At least with slavery you get free meals and stuff here I am paying my own room and board while Penn basically CHARGES me for my services. I feel like I'm in the freaking bizzaro world here. To make matters worse, I've kind of over extended my finances due to my crippling Bubblegum Crisis addiction and if I don't get paid tomorrow, well, some guy in southeast Asia is probably gonna be more than a little pissed off at me. But that's neither here nor there right now. I remember way back in the day I saw the preview for this show, Blood Reign, on an ADV tape and being absolutely enthralled. Even at a young age I was all about the "Music Over Action" and the slow singing while that crazy moth lady flew around fucking everything up pulled me in before you could say 'marketing ploy'. I didn't know much back in the day, when I was thirteen or fourteen or however old I was, but I knew that I absolutely had to have Blood Reign, or Curse of the Undead Youma as they were calling it at that time. Just my luck though, I couldn't find a single place that was offering it and I had not yet been informed of the miracles of internet purchasing.

 

So you could probably understand how enraged I was when I was finally able to acquire this "sweet" show a couple years ago. I mean, without delay (well, a delay longer than 2-3 weeks) Joel and I popped this bad boy in the DVD player and settled back for some mindless entertainment. It's unfortunate that Blood Reign is so mired down by its flaws that it never really becomes anything more than another indistinguishable OVA released in the late 1980s. It's slightly more than an hour of what could only be described as sheer boredom, which is something that doesn't even seem possible when all three of the main characters are ninjas. I mean, come on Japan, what is wrong with you people? You've got the coolest archetype on the planet and you can't even use it right? No, instead they just throw you in there and tell you absolutely nothing about what's going on. Not that it really matters, because I really don't think anything IS going on. It seems like the intent of this show was to make something with enough gore to give Angel Cop a run for its money and just see where it went from there. I can only hope that it's went no where, save for maybe the flaming bowels of hell. I feel sorry for anyone who's had to suffer through this awful, awful piece of entertainment. So bad that if you write me a clear, concise essay about how Blood Reign ruined your life I'd be perfectly willing to send you a dollar (maybe). I probably wouldn't do that, but if you write it I might be convinced to post it on the site. I mean, then we could have our own little support group for people traumatized by Watanabe and co.

 

I'm thinking that maybe a class action lawsuit is in the cards, but more on that some other time. Blood Reign is the story of the ninja Hikage, who still wants to be friends with his best buddy Maoru (who may or may not be a homosexual) even though the guy STABBED HIM IN THE EYE. If Andrew stabbed me in the eye, I'd break his arm and run him over with Bare's car. Then Bear would complain because I took his car and then I'd have to run him over too. Then I've got two dead bodies on my hand and what do I do? I'd probably end up cooking them and feeding them to Jerry. I mean, Filipinos eat dog... in fact, they consider it a delicacy! As far as I know, Jerry loves the taste of human flesh. Come to think of it... I haven't seen my best buddy Skabs in awhile... Blood Reign defies physics and pretty much every other natural law we hold so near and dear. Now, that's not necessarily something that's uncommon in anime, but it's taken to a whole new level. The fight scenes would actually be pretty cool if it wasn't for the fact that every time someone gets killed they spray out more blood than any human body could ever hold. It also seems that fatal wounds aren't very fatal in the world of Blood Reign. I counted at least two people that managed to speak even though their neck was punctured quite viciously. Without watching it I don't think you could really comprehend what I'm talking about, but a demon slices the shogun's neck clean through, at which point the shogun promptly turns around and gives a pretty verbose speech to his lackeys before his head falls off.

 

Now, I'm no scientist, nor have I ever touted myself out to be one. So I'm not really sure if people can do that, and the only samurai swords I have access to were bought at a flea market so they're not the best quality that you could get, though they're probably the most ornate crowbars you could buy for $40. Regardless, without the proper tools I have no way of testing whether or not someone can talk when they've been decapitated, but I'm gonna take a shot in the dark and say they can't and that Blood Reign is lying to us. It's not like they haven't done it to us before. I need only to point you in the direction of the trailer I mentioned a few paragraphs ago, which I still hold is a very well put together piece of work. Only it's a shame, like how actors only look really pretty because they're wearing all that makeup. Blood Reign is has caked itself in L'oreal cosmetics and now calls itself Catherine Zeta-Jones, when really it's more like a Rosie O'Donnel kind of show. I just don't get it, it had so much promise and then does absolutely nothing. I hate to spoil it for you, but the nonexistent plot is more nonsensical than any kind of action movie ever should be. At the end the chick from the second episode becomes the chick who died in the first episode, or they're the same person and there's like... time travel going on. I don't know, I don't really think it matters.