Mezzo DSA

Mezzo DSA was so fun to watch. The story isn't crazy or mind blowing most of the time but when it does have a more serious story to tell it does so well. When not being serious it's giving entertaining characters moments and well done fight scenes. The characters was the best part for me. The way Mikura teases the two main guys never felt annoying or as if she hates them. Kurokawa did a great job at explaining the story without being boring and talked down to. Tomohisa to be honest he is just there, I like that he's there but he doesn't do ... much.

If you have some free time and want to watch a short 13 episode anime over the weekend, then this is the perfect thing for you.

I would say this show has a plot and/or storyline but most of the time it is the typical “bad guy or assignment of the week” episodes and they do have their biggest case that serves as the main plot of the story and it’s finding out why someone wants Kurokawa, the bitter ex-cop and head honcho of the DSA, assassinated.

To recap on the main characters, Mikura is the brawns of the group that can kick a lot of ass and have a short temper when it comes to doing her job. Harada is the brains and the technical expertise of the group that handles ... all the robot bodies, just like Forte.

All three main characters are pretty decent like last time but here’s one thing that bothered me: when has Harada shown interest in Mikura because in the series, there were some hints at that although like the first Hentai scene in Forte, it felt very unnecessary and unneeded but then again, I didn’t mind the Hentai scenes in the first one. Also there is a new character introduced in the series and her name is Asami and you first see her appear getting beat up by grade school girls who are getting her lunch money or something like that and then she met the DSA and I thought The Boondocks illustrated that point where grade school girls are never to be fucked with. Anyway, Asami wants to be just like Mikura because of how skilled a fighter and a gun-toting girl she turned out to be. Thankfully, she isn’t up to Scrappy Doo levels but she still doesn’t feel that useful but only to add some cuteness into the show and that goes double for Mikura’s new design. Yeah, the animation in here is slightly inferior to Forte due to the fact that Forte did have the budget for 2 episodes and DSA has 13, it shows and it seems a little big off. Some of the original character designs were altered with different colors and face expressions. I also feel like they should have used some storylines from Forte to give the show more into a continuing plot like:

Remember the psycho insane girl, Momomi Momoi, which Mikura fought and killed? A longtime friend of hers named Sakura met the girl Momomi when she was about to get gang raped and Momomi rescued the girl and since then, they became lovers after that and when she is killed, Sakura swore revenge against the people who murdered her. I would have like to get more into that storyline and see how it progress instead of the Kurokawa assassination plot because the assassin hired to kill Kurokawa has got to be the most blandest characters in that show. He’s a very typical hired hand, mother was murdered and killed his father for murdering the mom and so on and so forth.

The dub wasn’t half bad although I kind of miss having Melissa Fahn as Mikura but instead they got Luci Christian to do her voice, mainly to the fact that this is an ADV dub and this actress does associate herself with that company and its successor, Sentai Filmworks. She was good in her role but it wasn’t a stand-out. The music is hardly noticeable and doesn’t stand out in my opinion and the opening song was alright and the ending song was something I would just skip just like the other ending songs in the past.

FINAL VERDICT: To me, this is the diet version of Mezzo Forte. Now I don’t miss the Hentai element in the series at all but as a regular action anime, this was a decent and relativity OK series but as a successor to the first OVA, this is very bland and it doesn’t leave much of an afterthought when you finished it. I make it sound like the first OVA was the masterpiece of anime and it wasn’t. The OVA was a stupid but very fun anime that I whole-heartedly enjoy. The series was OK but it should been tweaked a little bit more. Would I recommend this? Maybe to those who saw the first one and I recommend that you see the OVA before seeing the series.

Particularly long and difficult to watch as not a single episode is good nor entertaining enough to keep you awake. The series has not much to do with the OVA to start with and the characters are also very different from the movie. The little girl (brand new addition) is extremely annoying and her English dub is absolutely awful. I really don't see why anyone would want to watch DSA unless you are a die-hard fan of the OVA (and I personally LOVE the OVA). Again, it will be a MUCH different experience with the series. The art is also not great and the humor ... is hmm... pretty childish.