Kiddy Grade #1:
The Peacekeepers

75 minutes
English/Japanese
English Subtitles
Released: 02/10/2004
Reviewed: 03/08/2005

A gift can be a curious thing, can't it? An extra round at a bar from a stranger might be quite pleasing, but it could have dire consequences to you and your bathroom in subsequent hours. If a good friend of mine were to provide me with a tank full of deadly piranha I would probably be a little confused. The act of the gift can be very kind, even if the gift itself is more likely to maim you in your sleep.

So thank you, Funimation, you're very generous to give our little group these free DVDs through your proliferation program. I think it's a wonderful thing you're doing! It kind of sucks, though, that stuff like Kiddy Grade is made available. I respect nothing more than your commitment, that you'd ship off dozens or hundreds of these DVDs a month to your adoring fans. I just wish the DVD in question didn't make me wish for a torture less painful. Like, I don't know, a flesh eating bacteria or something. That'd be a nice change of pace after watching seventy five minutes of Kiddy Grade .

Kiddy Grade, which I will now refer to solely by the title of Fake Dirty Pair, is a collection of the space adventures of Eclair and Lumiere.** They're sort of like Kei and Yuri (who I want to be my girlfriends) except instead of worldly, intelligent secret agents they're just two enormous stereotypes. Eclair, our redheaded troublemaker, fulfills the average fan's requirement for top heavy bouncy chicks (and then some!) while Lumiere more than suffuses the screen with the requisite amount of lolicon (that's "preteen softcore porn", for our home readers) action that any anime involving A FEMALE CHARACTER seems to need right now.

Hot damn! There's nothing I love more than a twelve year old girl in a garter belt!

Eclair and Lumiere are more like the retarded versions of the "Lovely Angels". Instead of solving their problems through their crackerjack wit or feminine wiles (completely non-exploitative, of course!) they prefer to use the same damn powers every single time. There's only three episodes on this disc, so maybe I don't have a big enough sample size yet, but every freaking episode Lumiere uses her god-like ability of machine interface that doesn't seem to be restricted by material or distance. As long as Lumiere can touch something she has access to seemingly every computer system in the known universe. If she was a character in a fighting game you'd get laughed out of the arcade if you tried to play her.*** She's like a Ken-Ryu-Akuma(x2)-Rugal fusion. That's how cheap she is.

Eclair, comparatively, sucks. She has this lipstick thing, I guess. It's possible that it gives her super strength, except she doesn't have to wear the lipstick to get the super strength. Despite this curious fact, still miraculously survives giant spikes entering her massive bosoms like they were popcorn. As if that weren't enough, at any given time they'll call upon a giant robot that has a super shield that protects them from everything on the planet. He's sort of like Kei and Yuri's Mughi except he sucks and he isn't a giant space dog (a bragable trait).

The show doesn't even make any sense. It doesn't play by its own rules! Eclair and Lumiere appear to be desk jockeys that are finally given their chance at stardom only to have no problems single handedly wiping out giant armadas of the evil empires. At one point their dinky little spaceship destroys an entire fleet of space pirates while being flown by remote control. This is the fleet of space pirates that the flagship of their federation was absolutely terrified of. Why the hell even have a flagship? Why not just make a whole bunch of tiny ships? This is the spaceship they give to their low class agents? I would've figured it'd be a Honda Accord, not the death cruiser. I'm not sure if the director has any concept of what palpable danger is. Whenever a situation occurs, standard procedure is for the characters to moan and groan about how they're going to die for about five minutes until something comes out of the woodwork (usually Lumiere and her stupid electronics powers) all Deus Ex Machina-style and saves the day.

Fake Dirty Pair is such a waste that even the picture you see to the right couldn't save it. The picture that contains a girl looking perturbed, off center, with short hair that's also freaking SILVER. I'm pretty sure that if Jesus was a picture, he'd be that very one and yet even the love of our lord and master won't redeem this program. The boredom is so thick it just makes me want to break the shit. Fake Dirty Pair somehow manages to be disgustingly exploitative -- with its big breasts and twelve year old girls in maid's outfits -- AND the most doldrums inspiring crap on the planet. It's not even bad enough to bring me to a frothing rage. I just get this intense feeling of ennui and whine about it and that's not helping anyone. It's certainly not helping you. I'm sorry it has to be like this Funimation, 'cause I totally think you're neat. Next time I'm going to request something that will actually inspire some good feelings in me. Or any legitimate feelings at all.