Queen's Blade: Grimoire

Oh boy, where to begin with this one.

Queen's Blade: Grimoire is the 4th animated series in the successful Queens blade series and is my first experience with Queens Blade as a whole and despite the action in the series being surprisingly competent with some perfectly timed comedic moments - it is completely dominated by fan-service, fan-service, fan-service (Boobs, Boobs, Boobs) all the damn time. If that's what you want out of your anime, then this anime is definitely for you. Key note is that this short anime OVA takes place in an alternative setting from the established Queen's Blade series.

Queen's Blade Grimoire looks ... at the misadventures of a character by the name of Alicia who is a court magician that ends up opening a portal where a character by the name of Kyuel who has bunny ears comes out of the portal and lures Alicia into the portal that transports her into a world by the name of Mel Fair Land where Alicia desperately wants to get back to her own world. If you can't already tell, this is an homage to the traditional story of Alice in Wonderland and while Alicia is in this world she desperately needs to find and capture Kyuel in order to figure out a way back home but not without a few battles and a lot of silliness in between. Queen's Blade Grimoire in two short episodes basically takes established fairy tales such as Alice in Wonderland, Little Red Riding Hood, and the Little Mermaid and re-tells them in a queen's blade kind of way. Many of the characters established in this two episode OVA are going to be potential fighters for the next Queen's Blade tournament in Mel Fair Land.

With an OVA like this, I think the episodes move at a really good pace and when the action happens, fight scenes tend to be really good and really entertaining but it's completely blinded and bombarded by all the fan-service throughout the anime. Any time, and I mean anytime a battle happens or one of the many comedic moments happen - your going to see a breast. It's pretty much going to happen. Yet, every time Alicia loses her clothes regardless if its after a battle or when she drinks a potion that causes her to increase in size completely destroying her clothes in the process, the mad hatter shows up out of the blue and cuts her a brand new outfit.

The first half of the first episode of the OVA, focuses on plot elements from Alice in Wonderland while the second half of the first episode focuses on plot points from Little Red Riding Hood. This episode probably has the most hilarious moments especially when flowers randomly pop up and mock Alicia when she puts herself in an embarrassing situation. Villains are easily established without much depth but I don't think anybody would really watch this for the story. The second episode of this OVA literally focuses on the many plot elements of The Little Mermaid while putting in a pirate villain (Liliana) just to keep the flow of the story going. In the second episode of the OVA you have a mermaid that desires to have legs so she can dance like a human, and an overprotective father that is not a fan of her rebellious daughter. The mermaid (Tiina) is pretty much topless throughout the entire episode minus the poor excuse of a translucent top that she is actually wearing. There is also a behind the scenes villain by the name of Seiten that sporadically appears in both episodes and is kind of manipulating things behind the scenes.

As I stated above, when the action does happen it is entertaining but I find it incredibly laughable that it doesn't take long before there is a sword slash, or attack that results in having one or both of a female's breasts exposed. I guess in the world of anime, sex does indeed sell and this anime is certainly a perfect example of that. If you took the mountainous amounts of topless nudity, I think it would be a lot more enjoyable. The art is really well done, the designs of all the female characters are actually quite nice and I do like a lot of the weapon variety of many of the female characters that get their hands dirty when it comes to fighting each other. Surprisingly there is a bit of blood in the anime as well, especially when Alicia is fighting the big bad wolf in the second half of episode 1. The music is fitting for each scene it is used, but the anime doesn't really have any opening theme. It's just a story element to set up the initial plot-line of the episode and then the title card appears. That's pretty much it.

Overall, at it's very core Queen's Blade: Grimoire is the very definition of a fan-service anime. You can't really expect the most intricate of plots, but if you desperately need to see breasts all the time then this anime is for you. The fan-service comes across more comical than anything else but it's really hard to focus on anything else when there is nudity all the time throughout the anime even during it's most tense moments. There can be a few things to enjoy about it, but it's strictly a story that is fixated on its fan-service that it's hard to take anything else seriously even when it tries to be serious.