First let me tell you about Go Nagai. He is very influential anime director, who has actually made such classics as Getter Robo and magical girl Cutie Honey, and has inspired people such as Hideaki Anno and the director of Tokyo Gore Police. He is also known for bringing erotic themes to manga and anime, which back in the day was considered taboo but today is not as bad. However, what happens when you take a risque subject and make it the basis for your anime...YOU GET GIANT STEAMING PILES OF SHIT! That's right not one pile of shit, three piles of shit, and yes I did watch all three of them for the sake of curiosity and tell you all to stay away from these OVAs at all cost.
So what is Violence Jack about? It's about a guy named Jack...and he's violent. You think this all a joke do you? I'm not joking, this is it. The only other thing we know is that the setting is based in a post-apocalyptic world where resources are rare, men are evil, and women are all walking pieces of meat. Yeah, sounds like a whole barrel of fun isn't it? No, no it is not.
However, it's not the fact that plot of Violence Jack is bad, but more of the sense that the subject matter is probably the most heinous looking thing I've ever experience in my whole entire life. I've seen exploitation before, some people don't like it, some people do. For me, some of the best movies are exploitation (My favorite movie of all time: A Clockwork Orange technically is an exploitation flick). However, Violence Jack is wrong. It's just wrong. Seriously, there is no other way to put it, it's just horribly wrong.
The first OVA is called Harlem Bomber and it is the most shocking out of all of them. I'm going to just put it shortly what happens. There is a character known as the Slum King that owns a sex slave ring, and I'm stopping there, because what follows are nonsensical acts of pure heinousness towards all of humanity and what it stands for. It tells no message and is not in anyway justified. It is simply there just for shock value. The other two OVAs, Evil Town and Hell's Wind, are the same exact thing, just horrible portrayals of what "could" happen to people in a post-apocalyptic world. Some might say that yes, people could succumb to this kind of nature, but if you are going to do that then at least provide with some good story-telling as oppose to pure exploitation.
Let me tell you an anime that did this right: Elfen Lied. Elfen Lied can be debated to be same exact way. I mean Elfen Lied is similar that in that it also portrays human as despicable beings and does dapple in the same territory of woman being used for experimentation. However, where Elfen Lied at least told a interesting story, Violence Jack is pure shock value for the sake of being shock value and nothing else. In short, Violence Jack presents nothing and flaunts it in your face just for the hell of it.
It's not even we know much about Violence Jack other than the fact that he's this guy who kills whoever stands in his way.
Art and sound-wise there is nothing to gawk about. Even for an 80's OVA, I've seen better animation from Macross and Space Captain Harlock, two animes that were made on TV budgets and came out before Violence Jack. That's saying a lot of how bad this anime is if that's the case.
Overall, the three Violence Jack OVAs just piss me off completely. If you were asked to give someone a lesson on how not to make an anime, or any medium for that matter than Violence Jack should be at the top. I never want to see Violence Jack ever again. Go Nagai may have produced some very classic animes, but this is definitely not a work that he should be remembered for, so let's just hope that this anime is never touched and heard of ever again.
