Ranked #2353

Riding Bean

Riding Bean is one of Kenichi Sonoda's early works, and though it was originally planned as a series, only one episode was ever released.

The anime follows the exploits of the legendary courier "Bean Bandit" (a truly unfortunate moniker), and his partner Irene Vincent. They are framed for the kidnapping of a wealthy heiress, and are subsequently hunted by the police and various other parties.

The art and animation of Riding Bean is quite typical of it's time, and bears a resemblance in places to the style of Lupin and Giant Robo. Riding Bean does however have something that sets it aside - the chases. Very few animes are able to convey the feeling of a high speed pursuit, and Riding Bean is amongst the best.

The sound is of a very good quality, and all the gearheads (a.k.a. car fanatics) out there will love the roar of the engines in the anime.

Riding Bean has some memorable characters, and ironically enough, the most memorable is not Bean Bandit. It is in fact, the cars. The Bean Bandit drives a customised sports car called "The Roadbuster", and if you're like me (in other words, you like cars and racing), then you'll understand me when I say I WANT THAT CAR! If you watch the show, you'll understand why. I watched the showed at the young and impressionable age of 14, and The Roadbuster has been flitting around in my head ever since.

On the flip side, the police also have a car with which to hunt Bean Bandit - the Shelby Cobra GT500 **drools**

One other thing that needs mentioning is the character of Irene Vincent. I hope the name sounds familiar because Kenichi Sonoda later evolved her character into the famous Rally Vincent from Gunsmith Cats.

This is an enjoyable romp through the streets of Chicago, and the chases are truly memorable. If you're a fan of classic anime, or better yet, a fan of Gunsmith Cats, then this is a must watch. If you like action and adrenalin, then Riding Bean is well worth viewing.

If you're after romantic comedies, slice of life, etc, then this may not be to your tastes, but it never hurts to give it a try :)

Riding Bean is effectively a prequel (and dare I say - a pilot), of the legendary Gunsmith Cats, but it is just as enjoyable as GC. The chemistry between Bean Bandit and Irene Vincent is marvellous, and Inspector Percy is a hoot.

I found Riding Bean to be fast paced and highly enjoyable. The mixture of action and comedy is just about right for me, and I've rarely seen chases that match the ones in this show. read more

Ever imagined an anime version of "The Fast and the Furious"? Well, me neither. But if there was one, it'd probably be something similar to "Riding Bean" (okay, I concede "Initial D" might be a more obvious choice, but I haven't seen that yet).

"Riding Bean" is about cars. Cars, gangsters, and more cars, to be exact. All the action centralises around fast and furious car chases down the highway, or the main character (nicknamed "Bean Bandit") doing some incredible things with his incredible sports car (named "Roadbuster" - you just know it's a badass car because it has a name) to get him out of what seem to be impossibly tight spots. The action is very satisfying for the most part, but does get a little *too* over the top - by the end, this Bean Bandit guy was dishing out carnage comparable to Superman.

While "Riding Bean" is an action heavy OVA, the story is surprisingly clever, as it has more than its expected share of twists and turns that kept me guessing what was going to happen next. That said, the story is sometimes compromised by the OVA's appetite for over the top action. For example, I'd hardly think people who are attempting to get hold of a captive from a car would resort to shooting the car with anti-tank guns in order to try and stop it.

On the animation side of things, "Riding Bean" does well with its great action sequences. However on the negative side, there's something weird about some of the character designs that I can't quite put my finger on. Perhaps it's that ginormous chin sported by the Bean Bandit... I just can't get over it.

I gathered from other reviews that "Riding Bean" is considered the prototype of "Gunsmith Cats", as the two share the same creator. I can certainly see the resemblence in the style and setting (as well the fanservice), and in fact, the two both feature the character Irene "Rally" Vincent (something that I didn't pick up at the time). The general consensus seems to be that "Gunsmith Cats" is superior to "Riding Bean", but I have to disagree. I thought that "Gunsmith Cats" feels a bit stale, and does not really standing out in anyway. On the other hand, while there are times when it seems like "Riding Bean" doesn't quite know what it wants to be (at one point I thought it was gonna go down the perverted path, but the moment passed without amounting to anything), it has a much more nifty plot and action that gets the adrenalin pumping a lot faster. Overall, it's a well spent hour I'd say. read more

As a person outside of having to review the show, this show is pretty awesome for vintage anime and I truly injoyed it. As a reviewer… I have to nit pick. The problem with that is that the story is really very good and I believe it has the workings of becoming a whole series is the Manga-ka Kenichi Sonoda had not had a falling out with the studio. After the OVA was created, Kenichi created the manga and the manga ‘Gunsmith Cats’ where Rally Vincent was the star though her design was altered.

Anyway, going back to the story, it’s pretty awesome in how it shows the action scenes and everything. It feels like an American made movie more then just an anime with how many guns and vilence is in the show. It starts out with Bean being the get away driver for a bunch of thieves and then ends him being the hero of the show. It’s not making him an anti hero and has him as a regular guy getting money. He actually is rather strong, almost like Superman strong as he had picked up the front end of a car and also rammed his fingers into the metal door of the car to rip the door right off its hinges. Rally on the other hand doesn’t really do much in the show although she is a quick shot. The only thing I really noticed her doing when she didn’t have a gun in her hand was tell Bean to keep cool or try and take care of the little girl.

Going onto the cops side, the cops are damn idiots and Detective Percy should be placed into a mental hospital. Seriously, Percy is infatuated with trying to catch Bean at all cost and goes crazy when he thinks he can. He is the definition of a bumbling detective who gets into a hell of a lot of trouble but I guess I have to give him being smart enough to actually not get fired from his job. The cops don’t help the matter, always crashing into things or sounding like complete idiots or children as in the the small chant they do close to the end of ‘Bean, come out and play’ thing. And yet, in that all that’s said and done, it seemed to sort of fit to me.

The animation becomes really sloppy at some points, using many speedlines and odd movements that feel a bit stiff. The times that it doesn’t have these problems though, they are ether still shots or some very detailed action scenes. The eating habits are rather laughable though. It’s very exaggerated as though the animators had no clue how to show them eating so they slowed them down and made rather huge mouths. It becomes almost discusting at how they did it. Bean was designed rather interestingly with a little to large of canines making him look rather beastly.

The English voices are laughable at most, feeling mostly stale at the most intence times. It’s as though they were reading a script rather then playing the part. The words really don’t feel like they fit the mouth movements and sometimes the characters move their mouths when no one is talking. The only one that seems alright is Percy and he shouts almost every other sentence. The little children also seem to shout as though they can’t be heard any other way. Dispite that, the people that were picked to play the parts were actually what I would see for the type of voices coming from the characters. If they acted a bit more then shouted, it would have been even better.

I think everyone should at least watch this one once. Even with the flaws, the show is rather action pact and won’t leave you bored. Because of the flaws, the times that it does go into a slow pace, they feel a bit comedic and the script can be rather tounge and cheek at points.
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Riding Bean is a prequel of Gunsmith Cats, featuring a character of Smith.

Bean is a hired driver for sly tasks, be it driving criminals after a bank robbery, or taking the little daughter of a millionaire back to his father. For those tasks he used his bullet proof modern sports car and performs his missions without fail.

The story was pretty entertaining, sometimes silly but in a positive way at that. And was good for this genre of anime. The animation was very good and you can see that it had a good financing backing the project. The character were all consistent, except a slight fail that remained unexplained that happened near the end and concerned Bean, other than that good work.

Unfortunately this OVA is one of those that leaves the impression of a first episode of a series. And indeed upon reading some info on it, it was intended to be made as a series, but the plan was left for some reason unknown.

Rate: 7/10 read more