Mazinkaiser

Mazinkaiser is based on one of the first super robot shows, Go Nagai's Mazinger Z. I'd heard a lot of good things about this seven episode OVA so I was excited to see it. Unfortunately, it wasn't as good as I was led to believe. Mazinkaiser is also the name of the main giant robot in this show. It was originally created for the Super Robot Wars video games and apparently the fan reaction was so good that they decided to make an OVA series based on it. It's set in the Mazinger Z universe with the same characters as Mazinger Z. The characters are ... pretty archetypal; there's the hero that solves everything with bravery and manly yelling, there's the silly comic relief character, there's the girl, there's the scientist guys that do maintenance on the robots, there's the evil nemesis that wants to destroy our heroes. Pretty basic, but it gets the job done. Anyway, Kabuto Kouji, the main good guy, finds Mazinkaiser, the ultimate unbeatable giant robot, and Dr. Hell decides that he must destroy Mazinkaiser because....he's the antagonist and he feels like it. The problem with the show is that there doesn't seem to be any overarching plot. Each episode stands alone. The last episode was actually really cool but it isn't worth watching six average episodes to get there. The art is based on Go Nagai's original designs so it has an old-school style, which I like. The animation changes style from episode to episode. The first one is done with cels, some are done with real thick lines, and some are just done with computers. The sound is nice. All the sound effects are fitting, you can hear the robots stomp as they walk around and the laser blasts are good. And it has an awesome opening done by JAM Project. I'm more disappointed than anything else. Mazinkaiser had everything going for it, but it still turned out mediocre.