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MISC. MANGA, *Shadow Hunters

Mixing in elements of Buffy and Charmed, this American manga-styled color comic does dive into some serious fan service. Having nothing to do with The Mortal Instruments series, this title by Scattered Comics, Shadow Hunters is an ongoing supernatural series that caters to the cosplay-loving crowd.

A trio of ladies consisting of a brainwashing vampire named Jenna, the shapeshifting werewolf girl Jessika, and the water witch Renea set up their own swinging nightclub in order to trap stray demons. However, a monster hunting task force called "00" ends up getting in their way. Jessika gets kidnapped by some of their secret ops division, and learns more about the various shapeshifting races, while Renea runs across some reengage demons.

This has the potential to ba a pretty good series, even though it might be a little hard for some readers to take the change in artists from Issues #2 to #3. There's some sexy cosplay variant covers for this too if you're into that.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Hyper-Combat Unit Dangaioh

This 3-episode series was first released on VHS in Japanese with subtitles by U.S. Renditions originally titled Dangaio, but a British dub of the last two episodes were combined into a single dubbed feature by Manga Entertainment with the first episode being presented as a special "prologue" under the full title of Hyper-Combat Unit Dangaioh, which unfortunately is the more widely available version on VHS and DVD. The OVA was directed by sci-fi anime 80s expert Toshiki Hirano, who also created Iczer-One and Megazone 23

Four powerful ESPers(an 80s term for people with psychic powers)are brought together from different corners of the universe by the rogue scientist Dr. Tarsan, who wipes their memories to be part of a special team of mecha pilots that form the giant robot Dangaioh to stop the evil space pirate Captain Garimoth and his fleet. The teenage ESPers escape Tarsan and go to Earth, the home of team member Mia Alice. But Garimoth's agent, the cybernetic Gil-Berg, follows them, and forces them to form Dangaioh to stop his destruction of a major city. The Dangaioh team then decides to go back to Dr. Tarsan and begin their training to become a more effective team against Captain Garimoth's forces. A brief encounter with some assassins working for Garimoth reclaims some of team member Lamba of her former life as a princess. But then team commander Rol takes the Dangaioh team back to his homeworld to confront some old skeletons in his closet, including some traitorous rebels that have teamed up with Gil-Berg. Dangaioh and Gil-Berg have another fight to the death, which results in Dr. Tarsan sacrificing himself to save the ESPers by warping the remains of Dangaioh to the other side of the galaxy. Even though Gil-Berg still survives and rises in Captain Garimoth's ranks.

The OVA ends on a deep cliffhanger leaving our heroes' fate up in the air. However, a sequal TV series titled Great Dangaioh that came out over a decade later picks up a few pieces of the original OVA, although at first the TV anime looks more like an Evangelion ripoff. Dangaioh also appeared in its own video game, as well as some of the Super Robot Wars titles. Aside from the stupendous robot fights and mecha designs, the inconsistency of the series and cutting out of the first OVA episode makes it slightly hard to fully enjoy this 80s escapade.

OBSCURE O.V.A.S, *Elf Princess Rane

Otherwise known as Fairy Princess Ren, this 2-episode series was intended to be longer, but was cut short like a lot of OVAs from the 90s. It was an original anime not based on an existing manga or other material, but was full of what is commonly referred to as "gag manga" references.

Treasure-seeking teenager Go is on a field trip at a temple looking for a lead to the ancient treasure of what was called Salamandara, but proceeds to fall off a 30-story building and meeting a tiny elf named Rane who speaks in a jigsaw of phrases that Go and his friend Mari can't make out. Go believes Rane's presence is part of some destiny written down in an ancient magazine, and sets out with her to go back to the temple to look for the treasure. Mari in turn comes across a miniature witch named Leen the same size as Rane, although not apparently an elf herself since her ears aren't pointy. All this while feng shui corporate businessman Mr. Takuma has plans for turning the entire city(run by Mari's dad)into a giant amusement park, plus trying to win the heart of Mari herself who seems to have eyes for Go. Rane and Leen are each hunting for a treasure called the Four Hearts, even if there is some serious communication breakdowns between Rane and Go at first, although Leen has no trouble Mari understanding her they first meet. Speaking of which, Takuma has a language all his own that only his loving assistant Natsuki(one of Go's sextuplet sisters)can understand. This leads to a disastrous visit to a hot springs mountain for Mari's birthday where Go unwittingly confesses his feelings for her, even though they still haven't found the treasures yet.

Directed by Akitaroh Daichi, whose other off-the-wall titles include Animation Runner Kuromi and Jubei-chan, shows his chops here with his bombastic sense of comedic timing. The script is really all over the place, and very hard to keep up with upon first viewing. The dub for this was above the normal par by Coastal Studios which was produced similarly like their dub of Shinesman which does have some "Americanzation" of the dialogue but still hysterical for even a novice anime fan. The only drawback is that there isn't more of this past the second episode, so at least check out for some serious laughs!

ANI-MOVIES, *Son Of Batman

As part of the New 52 line-up of the DC Universe animated movies, Son Of Batman is based on the story arc, Batman And Son, but also part of this ongoing continuity. Although it brings to the table since the Justice League just formed, this story has Batman being around long enough to have a kid.

Ra's al Ghul is watching over his ninjas training in their mountain stronghold, when the League of Assassins(not "Shadows")gets raided by some heavily-armed attackers lead by Deathstroke. This version of Slade doesn't have superpowers, and here was trained to be Ra's al Ghul's successor, but was cast out. Unknown to him was that Ra's daughter Talia had a son named Damien after a past encounter of with Batman. Talia manages to escape with Damian leaving Ra's to die(for the last time?), and she takes him to meet his father. Batman at first has trouble accepting Damian's superior attitude, despite the fact that the little creep spent his whole youth being groomed to the ultimate warrior. Damian wants to find and kill Deathstroke, but Batman won't allow him to commit murder. Deathstroke meanwhile has captured the family of former Man-Bat, Kirk Langstrom, in order to create an army of ninja Man-Bats, as well as keeping Talia prisoner. Nightwing joins the ranks after nearly getting his butt handed to him by Damian, who now has taken up the mantle of Robin, although its hinted that he's only the second one to take on the title. After rescuing Langstrom's family, the Damian seperates from Batman to Deathstroke's hidden headquarters, an offshore oil rig with an underwater lair near a Lazarus Pit where he's keeping all his new Man-Bat ninjas. Batman rescues Talia, but not before she is shot by Deathstroke, so he revives her with the Lazarus Pit while Robin fights Deathstroke to the death, although Slade is dowsed with chemicals before apparently drowning so he might return with enhanced strength in future DC Universe installments. Damian decides to stay with Batman and be the new Robin with Talia leaving him so she can rebuild the League of Assassins.

This feature had some ecstatic fight scenes in it highlighting what a skilled ninja Damian was raised to be, plus some quality animation, although you see how much better Under The Red Hood was in comparison. The main problem with this though is the inclusion of Deathstroke as the main antagonist, where he wasn't even in the original comic and has no connection with the League of Assassins, when he could have easily have been replaced with a character like Bane or Sensei who actually had ties to Ra's al Ghul, like Deathstroke is just some character from the DC Comics roster to fill a spot when you need some ass-kicking ruthless merc. Aside from that, Son Of Batman definately has a place in the Batman animated movie pantheon, and is one worth keeping.

Long live Galvatron! Leonard Nimoy, R.I.P.

ANI-MOVIES, *Ultraman II: The Further Adventures Of Ultraman

Ultraman has had more spinoffs than any other TV series, so it obviously had to get an anime adaptation. It was redone as an animated series in the late 70s and early 80s by Sunrise who at the time was also doing the first Gundam TV series. The series itself wasn't released in English on its own, but the first four episodes were dubbed for an American release as a compilation film.

Set in the future, a strange message from space is seen all over the world written in the sky in an alien language. What it was really from the alien hero Ultraman who tries to warn mankind of changes happening to the Earth. He ends up fusing with an astronaut who joins up with a special scientific task force that is assembles select soldiers to handle these new threats to the Earth. The four parts of this movie have some random monster show up, and Ultraman intervenes to stop them. The best of which is in the first one where he takes on four frost-breathing Godzilla clones. He also fights a living tornado! But as usual, his greatest weakness is he can only stay in his giant form for a few minutes before exposure to Earth's sun kills him, like he's a Reverse-Superman or something.

This movie was one of the first anime titles to be released at the dawn of the DVD boom in the 90s and features some decent animation for the time. The giant monster fight sequences as disasters are exceptionally well done. If you happen to find a place to rent this or in a bargain bin, give it a look. It's a shame that the American production of Ultraman: The Adventure Begins pilot movie done in part by Hanna-Barbera hasn't been released out here yet.