BEING UPFRONT: A Pictorial Guide to Bodacious Women in Anime--Page 6 (H-K)

HAND MAID MAY
Kasumi Tani; CBD May; CBD Sara (left to right, upper row); CBD Kei; CBD Mami (lower row)

Kazuya Saotome (on the right in CBD Mami's picture, and the background of Kasumi's) is a shy but kind 2nd year electronics student at Ochanomizu Industrial College, whose goal is to build a Doraemon-style robot, which looks like a cartoon squid and is named Ikariya in its current form. He lives in a room in the Kasumi-sou, and Kasumi Tani, the just-tomboyish-enough cute daughter of his landlady, frequently pops into his room after crossing a ladder she suspended between their balconies. She gives Kazuya (and the viewers) plenty of eyefulls in hopes that he'll grab the hint at some point. She is seen here climbing into his closet, shouting through the wall at his neighbour Shikishima, who owes her six months' back rent. Koutarou Nanbara, possibly the loudest and most irritating character in anime, is a rich rival of Kazuya's who has always lost out to him and he now lives to make Kazuya suffer (but it frequently comically backfires on him, of course). His latest volley is giving Kazuya a DVD-ROM, which the dummy proceeds to actually use. It loads a virus onto his computer, which places an order with the Cyberdyne Corporation. In just a minute, a woman delivers a box to Kazuya, and he is quite freaked out to find out that it has a little female humanoid inside, which causes him to drop the box off his balcony, but he manages to just catch her. She turns out to be CBD (Cyberdoll) May, a doll-sized (who doesn't stay that way) maid robot who truly grows fond of him after he builds her a new way to recharge after her original charger was broken in the aforementioned drop. CBD Sara is the first one who Cyberdyne sends to collect May back, since Kazuya wasn't really told about the $1,450,000 price tag May has. She's quite ruthless in her mission, but also a bit incompetent (especially after Nanbara tries to help her out) and easily distracted by ramen, which she eats by the truckload. Other Cyberdolls (like Sara, these are all life-sized) which enter the picture are the cute and nine-year-old-childlike CBD Rena (not here for obvious reasons), the older-sisterly CBD Kei, who is intelligent yet restricted to computer-like logical thinking ("How many grams of salt is 'a little'"?), and CBD Mami, a matronly "American" Cyberdoll sent by his father (I kid you not) to help take care of Kazuya's new roommates and friends. The above pictured are all (to paraphrase the Chili Peppers) blessed with buckets of lucky mobility, and some episodes back away from the fan service, only to have the next one up it fairly sharply, as if the producers had to meet the quota. I'm not complaining, believe me, but others might. All that aside, it's actually quite a nice series, with the relationships between the characters being possibly its greatest strength, and I strongly suggest checking it out at least once.

On the Japanese side, you have official websites from

HAND MAID MAI
Aya Honda; Sara Mark II; CBD Mai (left to right)
I'm going a slight bit out of alphabetical order here because this OVA series is a splinter of Hand Maid May. In this series, Hideo Ozu is a frustrated filmmaker who had a stalled amateur movie project featuring one-time childhood friend Mai Kurosawa, which gets horribly scuttled by her attempt to debut as a high-profile actress. Now he works at an adult video production studio, where he is currently shooting the sequel to Star Rose, featuring the hard-boiled and tough but still sexy Aya Honda. Sara Mark II (who is seen collaged here since you don't see her face and her body at the same time in the first OVA, and yes, she does strongly resemble Ms. Honda) turns up and demands Hideo's stamp on her form--which turns out to authorize the delivery of three Cyberdolls to his home. Ai, Mai and Mii turn out to not only be maid robots, but top-quality audio/visual equipment; Mai is pictured above connected by firewire to Hideo's computer, allowing him to edit video. The first OVA of this title cheesed some people off, since Hideo is not really the nice boy that HMMay's Kazuya was, and a scene where Mai gets pressed into appearing in Star Rose II in a scene with Aya is a bit too discomforting for its intended laughs, especially with Mai seen crying in the next scene. While it's not as odious as Amazing Nurse Nanako's worst moments, it's still a bit much to digest if you're used to the sweeter original series. And if you are waiting for OVAs 2 & 3, well, according to WonderFarm, production company Five Ways went bankrupt, and those eps can't be released until legal matters are resolved. Here's the

IDOL BOEITAI HUMMINGBIRD (Eng: IDOL DEFENSE FORCE HUMMINGBIRD)
Fever Girls: Hitomi Nakajou and Reiko Hosokawa (left to right) In this OVA series from the mid-80's, the Japanese Government has inaugurated a program in which their Air Force is opened for civilian organizations to staff. While the corporations have kept away from it, several entertainment production companies start a project designed to feature their idols as pilots. Are you still with me here? Good. Hazuki Toreishi (Tracy?) is the mother and main career handler of the Hummingbirds, who are Kana, Yayoi, Satsuki, Uzuki and Mina (in descending order of age). Her husband/their father was a fighter pilot, and they are following his dream to become Japan's best--when they're not working on choreography, that is. In the second OVA, Summer '94, the Idol Defender athletic meet aboard the nuclear aircraft carrier Enterprise is interrupted by a scramble order, and three of the 'Birds go out, only to find that the invading pilot is not actually an enemy, but Goro Kadou. He was their dad's favourite pilot, but strikes them as being just rude. It turns out he's been hired to be the coach of the idol pilot duo Fever Girls, who are very sexy--and not a little catty and jealous, so they immediately start a rivalry with out heroines. They do have them beat in one category, at least--service. In one scene, we see them vigorously exercising in their room, bouncing with each coordinated move...in their lingirie. Good way of preventing jogger's nipple, you have to admit. After their appearances in this series, I think they went on to release the aerobics video 20 Minutes to a Slimmer Wrist. Basically, Hummingbird was a big grab at the coattails of Top Gun et al, but still pretty entertaining. If you don't mind that the character designs, animation and pop music styles are showing their age, and love both cute girls/idols and funky war planes, then this might be the series for you. I liked the first two OVAs (the music wasn't my thing, but, then again, you'd hate some of the music that is) and would like to see the other two sometime.

IDOL PROJECT
Mimu Emilton; Corvette Hyers; Layla B. Simmons; Extra Kaidou (also on lower right); Palpu Ranran (left to right)
Idols. Why did it have to be idols? A cute 14-year old named Mimu Emilton dreams of becoming an "Excellent Idol," and is rushing to get to an audition at the Starland Festival so she can sing her song (I know she looks out of place here, but watch the third OVA!). Along the way, she runs into several girls who turn out to be Excellent Idols. This includes Dance Idol Corvette, wearing a waitress outfit with bunny ears, who pulls Mimu up on stage and dances VERY closely with her before telling her that one of the things she needs to be an Idol is "rhythm," and warning her about the "very dangerous" Stage 7 on Twinkle Street. On this stage, Rock Idol Layla (electric guitar, skimpy black leather) and Ojousama (Queen) Idol Extra (piano, pink petticoats) battle it out on rising platforms with crashing notes and the words, "Guts!" and "Dignity!", respectively (they both seem to agree on "Cleavage!", though). After that, Action Idol Palpu Ranran turns up, merrily kicking the snot out of a few of her happi-coated fans (who, of course, love it), asks Mimu politely if she'd like the same, and then makes friends with her before telling her in a quite hyper manner that she needs to "relax" (she gets her turn(s) here as the star of an action/robot show in the third OVA, which has to be seen to be disbelieved). And that's just part of the setup in the first OVA. This show is a whirlwind-paced mishmash of comedy, parody, action, fan service and more cute than most people can bear (perhaps because it was based on a video game). Check it out.

IKETERU FUTARI Yuki Umemiya (left in picture) This short TV series (literally; 16 seven-minute episodes, all collected on one tape/LD/DVD) was part of the TBS TV variety show Wonderful in Japan. Keisuke Saji is a horribly lecherous high school student who borrows his dad's cell phone and winds up using it to hook up with supposed "enjou kousai" (paid dater) Akira Koizumi (right in picture). She's a mysterious girl who looks like Evangelion's Rei Ayanami with a personality transplant (albeit a five-letter one a lot of the time) and casts out looking for men to hang out with under the name "Alice." As soon as Saji finds out Koizumi is a student at his school, he trails her like goldfish feces trying to get her to go steady with him; damn the abuse she heaps on him, full speed ahead. In the second episode, we are introduced to Yuki Umemiya, Saji's very tall childhood friend, star of the school basketball team and unlicenced owner of two usually-concealed weapons (literally, in a couple of scenes; the one where she knocks over a stack of notebooks Koizumi is carrying, and their exchange afterwards, is classic). She wishes Saji would notice that she's not just a friend, but a young woman, and his seeming obliviousness to this due to his infatuation with Koizumi proves that he has all the intelligence and common sense of a glazed donut, minus the good taste. This deeply ecchi (I'll never hear a jackhammer the same way again) and farcical love comedy is most definitely for lads (and broad-minded fangirls with healthy senses of humour) only; consider yourself warned. Thanks to Bo Kurland for describing Saji better than I ever could. Anime Omiyage houses a gallery of screen captures, and this German page takes a look at the manga (with a few scans).

IKKI TOUSEN
Hakufu Sonsaku (BWH: 93cm/?/?); Goei (also on lower right) (top row, left to right);
Ryomou Shimei; Ryofu Housen; Kannwu Unchou (bottom row)
(Source: First episode)

Syuyu Koukin is a student at Nanyou Academy, one of the seven high schools in the Kantou district in which students of both sexes take part in brutal hand-to-hand combat in a battle for supremacy. Students who are fighters wear magatama (comma-shaped jewels; see also: Blue Seed) which contain the souls--and fates--of warriors from China's Three Kingdoms Era 1,800 years ago. Syuyu's cousin Hakufu Sonsaku has just transferred to Nanyou, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed (and hedge-chested) and ready, able and itching to open up some cans. Her strength impresses the gathered students, and some even wonder if she might be the current incarnation of the legendary Junior Lord of the Lords of Jiang Dong whose name she bears. The rest just wonder how they can get their hands on her jubblies. While she's undoubtedly a wicked fighter, she's also wickedly stupid and naïve, and even admits to it. This includes getting right into a fight as soon as she walks through the Academy gates for the first time...oh, and did I mention the first you see of her is her panties, and that a lot of her attacks are high and wide kicks? Not only does Hakufu move into Syuyu's house, but, as a bonus, so does her mother Goei, by his absent father's request. While Goei has trained Hakufu in martial arts since she was a little girl and is so strict that Hakufu's afraid of her (and her method of punishment) and she even intimidates Syuyu, she's also kind of naughty. Note that she takes her kimono off a bit before she starts drinking to celebrate their arrival, and she keeps an eye out for young lads to date with/drool over. Lucky little bas...anyhow. Hakufu's radical arrival at Nanyou attracts the attention of a lot of people there, including Ryomou Shimei, one of the school's Greatest Four. She's a cold, malicious fighter, wears a medical eyepatch and occasionally a maid's uniform (with a Studio-Fantasia-short skirt), fights using props like handcuffs, and is so hardcore that, during the first fight we see her in, she gets rather...aroused. Yow. Another one of the Greatest Four is Saji Genpou, an easy-going playboy type; Hakufu's bustline measurement above is the correct guess that he made after grabbing her during her introduction fight. He was the first boyfriend of Ryofu Housen, a fighter from Rakuyou High School. Mysterious and intense, she professes to hate men after going out with Saji, but is not exactly giving up on him (puts on Sweet's song "AC/DC"). She's responsible for the series' hottest scenes--and some of the most poignant. It's merely a matter of time before a Great Fighter Tournament takes place. Kannwu Unchou is a cool, quiet student brought in from Keishuu Gakuen, which is permanently neutral, to be one of the referees...or at least that's what we're told about her at first. Dangerous. Her chest doesn't get emphasized as much as the others', but there's no denying the fact, especially given the nice eyecatch of her in a bikini. Yes, Ikki Tousen is a speedball of the two elements that shamelessly pander to the male audience--sex and violence--but it still has an okay (if still pretty cliched) story with a few interesting twists if you choose to follow it that far. Just tell your brain to take 13 (episodes; pretty short for a fighting anime) and enjoy the female-clothing-rending battles.

An

I'M GONNA BE AN ANGEL! (Jpn: TENSHI NI NARUMON!)
Shinobu-sensei; Miruru (left to right)
A high school boy named Yuusuke is wandering through the woods, after taking a wrong turn and wiping out on his bicycle. He follows a path of discarded girls' clothing and encounters (from a great height) a young, childlike and very nude girl named Noelle (visible out the window in the left picture). Noelle takes a shine to Yuusuke, and before too long, she's convinced that she has to marry him, and that she has to become an angel to win his favour. She and her family, who turn out to be demons of all stripes, move into his house, and much screwball humour ensues. While Noelle herself isn't BU material (remember, "childlike"), it's a sign of how looped this show is that she's known for her extremely bouncy cheeks (the ones on her face, ecchi!). Two of the other characters in this series are Yuusuke's homeroom teacher, Shinobu-sensei, a blithe young woman who loves tight tops (either that, or she knows a damn good body painter), and Miruru, a cute but inept catgirl--who even says "nyao" now and again--with big...ears who is sent by the series' villain, Dispell, to investigate this girl who wants so badly to be an angel. She ends up falling hard for Noelle's brother Gabriel after he falls into her (quite the padded landing, that) and chases after him almost as much as Noelle does after Yuusuke, much to his discomfort (he's allergic to cats). This is one of the quirkiest and funniest TV anime series I have ever seen, with a great opening theme to match. Check it out when you have the chance.

For more info, pictures and cuteness with a half-twist, go to

INTERLUDE
Izumi Marufuji (left in left picture); Kaoruko Minegishi (right in right picture)
In this OVA series, we follow a typical male high school student (whose name is never given) through his average life with school and friends. Except for the unusual dreams he's been having and instances of seeing scenes of a dark city with an enormous moon, strange people and unusual, vicious monsters. Lately, those visions have been becoming more and more vivid, and bleeding over into his real world; other people are even spreading rumours about shadows parting from their owners and strange creatures roaming the streets. One morning, the male lead and his lively childhood friend, Mai Tamaki (right in left picture), run into a woman on a crowded subway train. Okay, Mai does. Face first. And complains about not being able to breathe. Later on, in one of those crossovers into the dark world, the lead and his friends meet the woman, Izumi Marufuji, and her co-workers at city hall's 2nd Affairs Department. Izumi is a nervous type (too many encounters with monsters and subway gropers will do that), but teammate Kaoruko Minegishi is a lot more level-headed. She carries a gun to battle minions with, and actually seems pretty happy with her role. She even dresses for it, which I chose not to show here because I don't want to ruin the surprise for you all. Sorry. Still, she does look good in a normal office outfit, doesn't she? If you were wondering, the other teammate, Yuuki Takase, is the one on the left in the right picture. Interlude is definitely a prime example of post-Evangelion anime; it combines comedy, drama, action, horror and mythology, and the big scoops of fan service it occasionally doles out doesn't cover up the fact that this is actually a pretty heavy piece of work. Also, if the is-this-real-or-illusion aspect of Perfect Blue and The Matrix are up your alley, then Interlude will be as well.

Official Japanese websites are still as they seem; here are

JUNGLE DE IKOU! (Jpn: JUNGRE DE IKOU!; no, I'm not joking)
Mii (far left!!); Rongo (the one with the big...hair near the middle)
Much like the famous Ranma 1/2 series, Jungle de Ikou! revels in its own absurdity. Here we have the story of Natsumi is a schoolgirl on the brink of adolescence (and to the right of Mii in the picture) who receives, from her archaeologist father, an ancient talisman retrieved from the depths of the jungle. One thing leads to another, and pretty soon our young protagonist has learned to transform into the proudly-proportioned flower angel Mii. Fortunately for less breast-fixated anime lovers, the show in general succeeds as a highly enjoyable comedy. Certain scenes will squeeze giggles out of even the most dispassionate viewer, like Natsumi and Ongo's (the kid-like devil in the background on the left) first meeting, or the way a classroom of lustful boys twists to the floor in a fit of sudden nosebleeds. When not captivating us with dead-on comic timing, curiously oversized breasts, and out-of-control magic, Jungle de Ikou! manages to give us a very real story, the tale of a girl teetering on the brink of physical maturity, and all the fantasies that accompany it. Natsumi's friend, Nami (third from the right), is a quiet girl who is into things like UFO's and magic. Later, she becomes possessed by the Water Spirit Rongo (far right), who was engaged to Ongo a long time ago, and is trying to get him back. While her own dance isn't quite as provocative as Mii's (some might find it a bit more disgusting, though), and while she doesn't bounce anywhere near as much (fire moves faster than water, y'see), both outfit and build crank the show's already high fan service quota higher. All in all, a great example of how ridiculously comical this sort of thing can get, even though the Lolicon aspects of the first ep will take some effort to get through. I can assure you that that part is almost entirely canned in the second and third eps, though.

Many thanks to AkioKid for writing the blurb about Mii, and supplying me with the picture on the left. I wonder where his Mansion of Midnight Eyes website went to?

To go straight to the source, visit Ikou director Yuji Moriyama's

KEY THE METAL IDOL
Sakura Kuriyagawa; Miho Utsuse (left to right)
Tokiko "Key" Mima is a young, waifish female robot who had previously been living in a small, remote city with the old man who created her. All this changed with the man's death, and a message he left to Key, saying that she should make 30,000 friends. This brings her out to Tokyo, where she meets up with Sakura, an old friend of hers from school who lets her live in her place and helps her out with her quest in other ways. Apart from being kind, loyal and generous, Sakura is hard-working (three part-time jobs), proud, strong, streetwise...the sort of person you want on your side. Sometimes circumstances do get to her and she loses her temper, but wouldn't you if you were in her shoes? While she does meet the guide's criteria, her dress and manner downplay her chest much more often than not; as it should be, since her heart is obviously much bigger. However, the show's producers just couldn't leave it alone; in the second OVA, not long after she has to keep telling a sleazy adult video producer that she doesn't want anything to do with him, she has a undressing/shower scene (take note, Alanis--this is real irony). Including this show in the guide was a tough decision, since this aspect is only the tiniest sliver of what the whole show is about, but the aforementioned scene tipped the balance. What helps Key decide what her course of action should be is hearing about and seeing videos of popular idol singer Miho Utsuse. By the time Key got to actually got to see her perform live, she had changed her image into something less, erm, obvious than the cel above, but, you have to admit, this look and outfit did definitely make viewers take notice. Then again, that's idols for ya.

The

KNIGHTS OF RAMUNE (Jpn: VS KNIGHT RAMUNE & 40 FRESH)
Cacao (left), and other characters

This is the OVA sequel to VS Knight Ramune & 40 Fire, and scriptwriter Satoru Akahori (Japanese only) isn't involved this time. Whoever took over yanked out all the stops in this, and quite frankly took it too over the top (excuse the bad pun). Not only are Cacao's eyes now visible, but so are other parts, and Parfait covers the back 36 (see right picture). In 40 Fresh, Parfait and Cacao have to go up against and rescue Ramuness IV (III was the one in 40 Fire), who turns out to be probably the meanest, most misogynistic bastard in anime outside of a horror hentai. The way he bosses around and mistreats crew members Tequila, Cocktail and Erect (yes, that is her name), among others, will make you want to hurt somebody. Cheers for making Parfait and Cacao capable fighters who do heroic things in the course of the series, but the radical change in tone from the earlier versions, and the lighthearted (but heavy-handed) fan service, as well as Ramuness IV's cruelty, are jarring, to say the least. English-version videos (sub VHS/betcha-good-money-it-sucks dub VHS (both two eps a tape--blargh!)/bilingual DVD (with all six eps on it, since the tapes flopped, and now marked down to $20, since that isn't doing great, either), entitled Knights of Ramune) are available from U.S. Manga Corps. Please don't judge the earlier TV and OVA series on the basis of this, okay?

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