Power Dolls
Complete Collection
ADV
60 minutes
English/Japanese
English Subtitles
Released: 10/21/2003
Reviewed: 10/18/2005
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Power Dolls
ADV
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Let me give you the skinny. Some many years ago I bought anime by the boatload. I use this term almost literally. Hundreds of DVDs, most of them crap. In my naiveté I thought that strong effort and lots of material was the recipe for instant success in the market of the internet. After all, it worked for AnimeonDVD and to this day they're still one of the most important and influential anime websites on this thing people like to call the world-wide-web. Success has not come to fan-service.org in any kind of noticeable or bragable form, but a fortunate effect of this is I have (mostly) managed to curtail my spending habits where DVDs are concerned. Now I only buy the sort of DVDs I'm sure I like. Needless to say, those kinds are few and far between. |
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With my first permanent, steady source of income in five years came the shakes of post-traumatic stress that must accompany any bank account of mine not teetering on the brink of overdraft charges. Buying overpriced DVDs that I don't even want is a staple of my existence, it's something that defines Dave as Dave. Otherwise I'd have all this money and then where would that leave me? ADV didn't see fit to let my account wallow in its own excess. They just had to have a ridiculous sale, providing DVDs of awful quality for as low as $3 a pop. At that price I could find no legitimate excuse to avoid the purchase of said DVDs, though I admit that I didn't try to stop myself with any words or actions you could in good conscience refer to as 'fervor'. I placed my order with the promise of a free gift only spurring me on.** With this event now gloriously past and the merchandise in my possession I am pleased to say that I have a stock of crap anime that will most assuredly last me for many years of come. Oh, you'll marvel at the kind of pain I can extra from these sixty minute videos. Cyber Team in Ahkibara, Magical Shopping District Abenobashi. If it's even a little bit out there... I've got it! |
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A small selection of them might be good, but most aren't worth the time of day. This is most assuredly the case with the excessively boring and unimaginative Power Dolls, whose advertisements for a corresponding video game caught my teenage eye on more than one occasion some many years ago. I mean, chicks in giant robots?** What more could you ever need? Apparently a whole bunch. Power Dolls is a paint-by-numbers attempt to make something to appeal to... I don't know... some creepy anime subset. As you can see just by a brief glance amongst the screenshots, it is populated solely by women with that really creepy angular, glossy hair that was so popular in the mid-90s OVA market. I'll never get it, but I am a hundred percent sure that I blame people like Masami Obari for making things like this happen. If it wasn't for stuff like the similarly-bad Virus then I don't think we'd be having this conversation. Maybe anime would've shot off in a whole new direction! But somehow I doubt it. |
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Maybe it's not Power Dolls' fault that it's a misshapen lump of crap with no real direction, story, or action sequences or anything with even one iota of dust in common with the word (and concept of) 'quality'. The characters are hackneyed before they leave the gate... lame people like a hardass leader, a hot headed youngster with a bleeding hard, and a rote ice-queen who has an apparent degree in statistics. These painfully bland characters go on painfully bland missions, including one where the leader attacks and destroys a dam built by the bleeding heart's father, presumably just because she wanted to see if it'd "get her goat". That kind of nonsense permeates this show, but I didn't have much time to consider it. By the time my disinterest in the short OVA had reached the breaking point, Jerry's good buddy and schoolmate Hooper announced that the Polish sausages he was grilling had reached the point of absolute perfection. And perfect they were! With a liberal addition of eggs and cantaloupe I was well on my way back to the sanity that Power Dolls so forcibly threatened to ruin. Power Dolls is crap, unmitigated crap that doesn't deserve to be foisted upon anyone for any means. But for $3 I guess I could learn to survive the journey. More content is always a good thing! So thanks for that ADV... but I really hope Hooper shows up with more sausage next week. |
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