BEING UPFRONT: A Pictorial Guide to Bodacious Women in Anime--Page 10 (T-W)

TARUTO, MAGICAL MEOW MEOW (Jpn: MAHOU SHOUJO NEKO TARUTO)
Chiffon; Candy (left to right)
Hi, cat-ear fans; have we got something for you. In the beginning of this series, we find out about the Nekomata family, a legendary, mythical family of cats who sent their princess off into another dimension to get her away from a devastating war. Taruto is a young and beautiful female kitten, who appears to the rest of us as a cute cat-eared little girl in a frilly dress. She insists that she's the princess of the Nekomata family, and she actually is able to use a bit of magic, albeit mostly not very well. She has been adopted by the kind and gentle (and kind of dough-headed) dessert-making bishounen Iori Monaka, who she loves very much, and they have just moved into a new house in Okashina with Iori's younger sister. Given the dessert angle, I suspect that Taruto's name was supposed to be anglicized to Tart; makes sense, but it wouldn't play well in England, would it? Taruto's friends Chitose and Charlotte--two other cute nekomimi--don't believe Taruto's claim. In the second episode, when they see her trying to make spring-like weather appear, they decide to take her to see someone with a bit of knowledge. This turns out to be Chiffon, who is not only a more mature catwoman, but also wears both half-glasses and a slinky dress very well, both at the same time (three fetishes handled at once; nice job). Taruto frequently returns to her with questions (and, of course, for us to see what colour of dress she's sporting this time). In episode nine, we are introduced to Nuga, an elderly, ailing male Iriomote mountain cat who has turned up in Okashina. He tells us about when he was young on the remote semi-tropical island he grew up in, and was picked up by an American cat named Candy, who takes him back to her master, a kind American man who she calls "Jelly Beans-san." He's a scholar who is there for a research project, and Nuga stays with them until the day they leave, hence the sad look on Candy's face in the picture above. Nuga's passing through because he hopes to go to "Ameringo" and be with the two of them again. Can't say I really blame him; can you? Despite the obvious welcomes to the page (and the obsession that Chitose has with Taruto's long tail), this remains a sweet and light--but not too light--dramatic fantasy series. The similarities between Taruto and the 1984 shoujo anime movie Wata no Kuni Hoshi (AKA Star of Cottonland) are unlikely to be coincidental, but creator Kaishaku (Steel Angel Kurumi) should be given at least a little credit for choosing a not-so-obvious title to cop from.

For all you Japanese-speakers (or people who just wanna look at the pretty pictures), here's

TATTOON MASTER Nima (or Bala, if you get the dub) (BWH: 34"/23"/33"--her estimate) (Source: Anime V insert '96 OVA Gals) Hibio Hibino (or "Eric," if you get the dub) is a short-fused, blunt and occasionally violent teenaged boy with a chip on his shoulder about life in general and women in particular (especially class president Fujimatsu ("Lisa" in the dub), who is in the background of this picture). His mother, an archaeologist, encountered a mysterious desert tribe called Tattoon, whose members practice what is called "pattern magic." Nima ("Bala" in dubspeak), the leader of the tribe, was shown a Hibino family photo, and she was so taken with Hibio that she decides to mysteriously appear in front of him, out of thin air, and announce that they are to be married, which doesn't please him. He hopes to get rid of her somehow, but it's hard for him to do that when she bounces out of the front doorway to greet him with open arms. The character design shows a very obvious Urushihara influence (minus the nudity), but what's wrong with that, apart from the fact that only two OVAs were made? Not tired of reading yet? Well, Tattoon Master is reviewed at Astral Animations. English-version videos (overpriced sub VHS/over-screwed-with dub VHS) are available from ADV Films.

TRIGUN
"Maids"; Elizabeth (left to right) In episodes 5-6 of this TV series, male lead, outlaw, wanted man and dab hand with a gun (and anime's smoothest dweeb since Lupin III) Vash the Stampede has entered the dying Inepril City, where the residents are convinced that the cure for their crumbling power plant is the $$60,000,000,000 reward on his head. However, events occur that make the city's residents go from trying to capture him to loving him, including the brief (two seconds) but obvious affections of the fine upstanding ladies pictured here. However, the high-strung and tenacious Meryl Stryfe, one of two women from the Bernardelli Insurance Society who were sent out to find Vash and prevent any more of the cash-draining property damage that follows him everywhere, stops him from taking them up on their implied offer with a single snarl. Later on, Elizabeth, chief engineer of the Marius Breskin Kantacle Industrial Technical Union work dispatch team, is hired to help restore the plant, and in turn she hires Vash to guard her. Given her obvious charms, he doesn't have to be asked twice, and she leads him on something fierce, including calling him "Pochi" (a common pet dog's name in Japan). For some screenwriters, that would be enough to work with, but, like all the characters in Trigun, Elizabeth has a past that defines what she is now, and learning about it (and all the others') is a large part of this series' appeal.

In Trigun,

UFO PRINCESS WALKÜRE (VALKYRIE?) (Jpn: ENBAN KOUJO WARUKYURE)
Walküre (BWH: 86/56/83cm); Hydra (BWH: 87/57/83cm) (top row, left to right, and middle column);
Sanada-san (BWH: 89/55/87cm); Raine (bottom row, left to right)
(Source: tokinoyu.net)

We bring you to Hagoromo Town, where a quirky romantic comedy TV series takes place. Kazuto Tokino is a young man who runs the Tokinoyu public bath, which he inherited from his grandfather, with the help of his ultra-practical younger sister, who balances the (precarious) books and occasionally watches the door. He's a kind, hard-working salt-of-the-earth type who loves being able to cater to his wide customer base--as in, including several varieties of aliens--and, of course, us lads get to enjoy the occasional changing-room scene. However, this quaint setting gets thrown into chaos when a UFO crashes into the roof of Tokinoyu, nearly killing Kazuto. However, the pilot, Princess Walküre of Valhalla Planet, gives Kazuto half of her soul to keep him alive, and falls in love with him. While she normally is a kind, beautiful and intelligent woman, her timeshared-soul version is a cute and overly playful--all right, kind of bratty eight-year-old, and this is the one that usually keeps close to Kazuto (to some others' suspicion). That is, until trouble happens and she kisses him when their souls resonate, which causes her to transform to her normal, more powerful self--including her quite healthy breasts sproinging out of her chest. Cheesy? You bet--but it makes me smile. She was running away from Valhalla Planet because she was dead set against her father trying to arrange a marriage for her (usually to another planet's royalty), which angers Princess Hydra. She crashes her own UFO into the Shinto shrine of Akina, the priestess and Kazuto's childhood friend who, deep down, wishes she was more than that, and is quite jealous of Walküre's relationship with him. Hydra is trying to get Walküre to come back to Valhalla so that she won't get stuck with the arranged marriage herself. After she blasts away at her and Kazuto, Akina plants a seal on her head to stop the destruction, which causes her body--but not her mind, which is still salty and sometimes brutally honest--to turn into that of a less-powerful child as well. Of course, when Akina unseals her so that she can fight, she also transforms, and we get another couple of eyefulls in the process. She winds up staying at the temple and occasionally tries to break up Kazuto and Walküre's relationship, sometimes with Akina's help.

Shortly after Hydra arrives on Earth, Sanada-san, the cat-eared Maid Chief of Valhalla Planet, comes looking for Walküre. She eventually finds her at Kazuto's bath house, and is smitten by how cute she is as a child. When she sees how much Walküre adores Kazuto, she immediately kowtows to him, referring to him as "son-in-law," and moves into a room at Tokinoyu so she can serve them. However, Sanada-san isn't a doormat type; she's actually quite high-strung, which can be cute when she's fawning over the Princess, but dangerous when she reaches for the firepower. This includes a gun that turns girls into cat-eared maids, who not only show loyalty to Sanada-san and Walküre, but help staff the bath house for free. Handy, huh? Just when we thought we could get accustomed to this odd arrangement, another one of Valhalla's princesses (there are eight in all--one for each nation in Valhalla--but only these three get significant air time), Raine, shows up. She's a bratty little one who wants big sis to return to Valhalla as well, so she tries to break her and Kazuto up using her skills in disguise; the picture above is from one of those transformations. It works well with clothes and faces, but keeps her body (and the small antenna on her head) the same, which makes for some nice laughs and even a bit of bouncing where you previously didn't expect it. Walküre is an odd mix of romantic comedy and SF spiced with fan service and just a touch of taboo (depending on how you feel about an eight-year old glomping onto and kissing a high-school lad)--and I like it.

Wanna take a bath? Go to the official web site, tokinoyu.net (Japanese only). A second series , entitled EKW: Jyuuni Tsuki no Yasoukyoku (Eng: UPW(V): December Nocturne, has run in Japan, and, according to rumours, there's a third series in production right now; whether it's TV or OVA, I'm not sure, but I look forward to it. The second series is on my next shortlist, so I should have watched it and reported on any new characters in it by the next update.

ADV Films have just recently announced that they've licensed the first series. However, several fans are now wondering which spelling the lead princess' name should have--the English (Valkyrie) or the German (Walküre). For the record, I prefer the German, but I'll be fine with either one.

USAGI-CHAN DE CUE!!
Mikami Inaba/Mimika (in all pictures in the top row!);
Miku Mizuki (left in picture); Koshka Nekoi; unnamed beauty contestants (bottom row, left to right)

This is one of the very few titles released by H anime company Pink Pineapple that doesn't have any sex in it (at least, as of the first two episodes), but makes up for it in fan-service-a-go-go. Haru Matogi is a gentle high-school student who happily takes care of the animals the school keeps on the roof, and they love him in return, especially Mimika the rabbit (pictured on the right). Mikami Inaba helps him out with this, or rather, hangs back, smokes a lot of cigarettes and pokes fun at him. She's a real tough cookie (made with a lot of yeast, obviously) with a long history of beating the snot out of people, and thus is always challenged to fight by other toughs. During one of these fights, she punches the thug through the animal cage, and he falls off the roof, taking the rabbit with him. She finds herself possessed to save her and she dives after him and grabs Mimika from him, clutching her closely to protect her. In midair, they fuse together into the bunny girl in the middle, with Mimika's mind taking the reins, and she lands safely and hops away. Shortly afterwards, Haru is quite surprised to find a very affectionate, literally bright-eyed, bushy-tailed busty blonde all over him like scum on politicians, but it only takes one close hug (with appropriate squish) for him to understand what's up, doc. Haru's childhood friend, Miku, is frustrated that Haru only sees her as a friend and that Mikami seems to be getting closer to him (why else would the delinquent want to help him with the animals?), but her jealousy goes down around the transformed Mimika, and she even befriends her; a refreshing change from most other anime like this. Mikami's tough reputation still follows her, though, and when she needs to, Mikami's mind takes over the body and she changes into her old self, only with cute black ears. Hey, all the better to distract her opponent until she gives him a good butt stomping. Behind the scenes, it turns out that this is not an entirely unique phenomenon; near the end of the first OVA, a new cat/girl "fusion" named Koshka (Russian for "cat") has just registered in the school as a student, and is now in Haru's homeroom. That evil glint in her eye is not unfounded--and not just because she's part cat. The second OVA is based around the school beauty contest, which not only allows us to see a bit more of Mimika-chan, Miku and Koshka in their glory, but these two unnamed contestants. All we get is a pan of this still, really, but it still works, doesn't it? This is based on the manga by

VANDREAD
Jura Basil Elden (BWH: 93/60/91cm); Barnette Orangello (BWH: 87/58/89cm); Buzam A Calessa (BWH: 89/63/90cm) (left to right) (Source: Official Vandread Website)
During the space colonialization, a ship got lost and its crewmen and women divided, with each sex occupying its own planet and reproducing via genetic engineering. An interstellar war broke out between the two of them, and a crew of pirate women from the Mejale empire attacked the men's empire Tarak during the launch of their new flagship. The hot-headed Hibiki Tokai, sick of his status as a lowly gruntworker, had been planning to steal one of the mechas he had been helping to build. He, Bart Garsus and Duero Mcfile are captured by the pirates and taken aboard their spaceship, the Nirvana. At first, the three of them were terrified, especially given the stories they had been raised on about how women eat men's livers, but all three wind up finding out first-hand that they were wrong, and the women are surprised by them in turn. They wind up being given respectable positions on the ship, and even some positive (and very curious) interest by some of the women--which helps when they all learn that their real enemy is not each other. Three of the Nirvana's crew include Jura Basil Elden, pilot, highly emotional and vain flirt, and owner of the biggest...hair on the ship (Note: Meia Gisborn, the woman in the background, appears to qualify for this page...until you see her wearing anything other than her standard outfit. Cool character, but she's not in). She is closest to fellow pilot Barnette Orangello, and Jura even makes noises about wanting to start a family with her...but she's also curious about what it would be like to reproduce the way men and women used to. Buzam A Calessa (just call her B.C.) is the stoic sub-commander, but she's not afraid to wear an outfit which leaves little doubt about what she's made of. Part comedy, part romance, part space opera, part fish-out-of-water story--okay, part eye candy as well--and all excellent.

Apart from the official Vandread website (Japanese only), you can follow the bouncing Jura through Vandread Stages and Nirvana's Safe Haven.

English-version videos of the two TV series (dub VHS/bilingual DVD; The Second Stage is a direct continuation of the first series) are available from Geneon Entertainment (USA) Inc. (formerly Pioneer). Here's their official website.

VARIABLE GEO
Yuka Takeuchi (BWH: 88/59/88cm); Jun Kubota (85/60/86cm); Eleanor "Eli-lin" Goldsmith (91/57/88cm); (top row, left to right);
Eleanor's employees (middle right); Ayako Yuuki (85/54/88cm); Satomi Yajima (78/51/82cm) (bottom row, left to right)
(Source: The Variable Geo Complete Visual Collection artbook)

In this video-game-turned-OVA series, the faltering family restaurant industry is given a boost by sponsoring fighting tournaments between waitresses. It's not long before Full Contact Waitressing becomes a major success, and female lead Yuka Takeuchi of Hanna Miller's (look familiar?) in Tokyo enters the Variable Geo tournament to test her skills. Her first opponent in the first OVA is the quite vicious Jun Kubota (of the Sky Lark restaurant in Kanagawa), who was qualified to be an Olympic athlete but didn't make it in due to her unsportslike conduct. Later, Yuka encounters American-born Eleanor ("Call me 'Eli-lin'") Goldsmith, who is the manager and star fighter of her own restaurant in Osaka, the Rival (that's a lighter she's holding in her cleavage, by the way; makes for a fiery attack), and who never goes anywhere without her employees/gang disciples, who are pictured on the right cheering on their boss. Ban-ZAI!

Also appearing for a short time in the first episode is Ayaki Yuuko, who works at the restaurant/dance bar SoTO in Kyoto, is never seen with her eyes open and loves to tease and flirt with her opponents as she fights them. Her spins and twirls in her single match in this series are impressive. Her opponent is Satomi Yajima from the Bikkuri Monkey in Tokyo. She has been a long-time friend and former sparring partner of Yuka's. She originally doesn't want to enter the V.G. tournament, but circumstances (and a strange man) point her to go up against V.G.'s finest. While her bustline isn't as impressive as most of the other cast's are, she gives enough obvious turns (including one from a cloth-rending swipe of Ayako's Juliana dancing fan) to place here.

While a show about women with large breasts fighting it out is inevitably going to be a hotbed for tearing of clothes and other anatomical displays, Variable Geo frequently views the darker side of it. It addresses the question of exploitation of women in media events by displaying it in a manner that can't be explained away as anything else. When we, the audience, see the parallels between 'V.G. tournaments' and our own sporting events, the exploitation which occurs in those real-world events comes to mind. In V.G., it's deliberate, extreme, and occasionally cruel and malicious, but it's also an essential element of the story, and not prurient. I feel it important to add that V.G. is neither misogynistic nor androphobic; one doesn't see the sort of mistreatment that's in Knights of Ramune.

For much better service, check out the specials at Burning Night Raven's

VIRUS (AKA VIRUS BUSTER SERGE) Erika Tinen As you might have guessed by the design, this TV series is Masami Obari's work. In Neo Hong Kong in 2097, an entity named Incubator has created a virus that can infect both man and machine. A special law enforcement agency named STAND is created to combat the virus and its effects. A young man named Serge attempts to kill Raven, the head of STAND, because of dreams that tell him that this will avenge the death of a friend. Due to several turns of events after he attempts to steal one of their Variable Gear armoured suits, Serge is made aware of his sharp combat talents, and joins STAND (mostly to avoid being jailed). One of the other members is Erika, an energetic and cheerful (among other attributes) woman, who grew up in the same neighbourhood as Serge. She becomes interested in him almost from the beginning, thus adding an extra dimension to the plot. Yes, I said plot. Being a TV series, someone seems to have put some effort into getting a story that could carry 13 eps together, and while Erika doesn't do the fanboy pogo, the show always finds ways to not let you forget what exactly her appeal is (including a scene in the second episode in which she strips down so her fighting armour can be placed on her body). No more English info pages left that I can find, so here's my favourite fallback: The Anime Critic. English-version videos (bilingual DVD) are available from Manga Entertainment. They've been reported to have redone the OP and ED sequences. If this is true, then it'd be a good thing I was leery to begin with.

VIRTUAL STARS
Yukari Ichiyouji If I read a German web site via Babelfish correctly, Virtually Real was Fuji-TV and Pony Canyon's showcase of CGI "virtual stars" similar to the "virtual idol"

VOLTAGE FIGHTER GOWCAIZER Karin Son; Shaia Hishizaki (top, left to right); Kubira; Suzu Asahina (bottom row, left to right) Like Fatal Fury, Gowcaizer is another Masami Obari speciality. Karin is the perky (and somewhat ditzy) High Priestess of Heaven, male lead Isato's girlfriend, and wearer of a battle outfit that contains but doesn't restrain, allowing for fully independent movement. Shaia is described on the Manga Video box as a "hot and sexy super idol" (read: Jiggle-bait) whose fighting garb threatens to spill her out of the sides. Remind you of a certain bouncy ninja? You can guess which one gets the obligatory shower scene. Kubira is a fighter who Isato's friend/comrade Kyosuke Shigura conjures up from another dimension. She originally appears in the form of a big mean-looking dog on fire, and then settles in as a brunette bag of water balloons in a killer go-go outfit. Frightened cats don't jump as high as her first scene in Round 2. Suzu Asahina is the odd one out here. She is very close to her twin brother Ryo (they fight together as one being, amongst other things), and both are aligned with Bad Guy of the Show Ozaki/Master Ohga. Being a more serious/tragic character, she doesn't get the, erm, comic relief the rest do, but she is state-variable. Her own first scene in Round 2 is fully nude and switches her between high school senior and feature-attraction stripper at different viewing angles. Fists and feet obviously aren't the only things that go flying around in Gowcaizer, and members of the Church of the Washboard Abs will probably like this Obari title more than any other. Obari also tries to give the show more plot than the likes of Battle Arena Toshinden, but it's still quite a muddle, and seems secondary to what you actually see. About the only off-putting things about the female characters are the sharply-angled jawlines and the eyes which are almost all pupil, which give their faces an insect-like quality (and has earned the show the nickname "Cowgazer"), but thankfully it's not quite as pronounced in the animation as it is in the still drawings. I can't find any more good English info sites, so will you settle for a few pictures and a whack of negative reviews? English-version videos (duhhhhh-b only VHS/bilingual DVD of an edited "movie" version; put the original OVAs on DVD already!) are available from U.S. Manga Corps.

VOOGIE'S ANGEL (Jpn: DENNOU SENTAI VOOGIE'S ANGEL)
Voogie; Rebecca (left to right)
One good(?) Obari show deserves another one. In the fine tradition of many get-the-cuties-to-fight-it-out anime, this is set in a catastrophic future our heroines are fighting to put right. In this case, in the year 202 (new), humans are forced to live in underwater cities because space emigrants, or SE's, have taken over the land. 100 years after the invasion, a battle cyborg team (four fighters, one communicator/co-ordinator/general brain) was formed to fight the SE's. Originally called the Angels, they were renamed Voogie's Angel when inexperienced (she had just woken up from her cyborg operation one week before the start of the series) but enthusiastic new leader Voogie joined. She may not seem upfront based on this pic, but Obari has to let her have a couple of bounces. But of course. Rebecca is the "war otaku" of the group, not to mention the most powerful and most-cyborg-enhanced Angel, so she handles most of the combat (which probably explains the extra padding over her upper ribcage!). Possibly the most notable thing about this OVA series is that very few of the euphemistic things are notable. There are a lot of female characters in this series, but only these two made it onto this page. In fact, most of the fan service in VA is big explosions, and not a little bit of hand to hand combat. Still, if you can find it as cheap as I did ($10 for the DVD when I mail-ordered it), it's not a bad little bit of escapism--even if the ending is kind of anticlimactic.

The Man, Hitoshi Doi's extensive

VS KNIGHT RAMUNE & 40 FIRE
Pheremone Lip One of the funniest shows in the whole guide, thanks to the twisted pen of Satoru Akahori. The warrior villains to Ramuness III's heroes in this show are a pair of people whose archetypes are so exaggerated that you just can't help but laugh at whenever you see them. The male half of this duo is a self-absorbed body-sculpting idiot named Narcissus Dandy. The star of this paragraph is Pheremone Lip, a woman with enormous blonde hair, an equally enormous bust and...not much else, really. For the first few eps, during times of crisis (i.e. fighting with our heroes) you will see her handling the situation by gratuitously fondling her own weapons, with more than a few well-placed utterances of "Ooh!" for good measure. So out there that you don't know whether to bust a gut or your eyeballs. I nominate Lip for the title of Queen of Fan Service, not necessarily because she does it better than anyone else, but because that's her single unabashed purpose in the show, covered with just the thinnest veneer of evil. In fact, they had to crank up the evil quotient when they cut down the fondling, and she ends up handling a whip instead. You might be attracted to the show by her, but it's everything else in it that'll make you stay with it. I might add that it's later in this series that you also get an idea of how Lamuness' teammate Cacao is really built.

Note: You may be more used to the spelling "Lamune," due to the fansubs, but I've had the soft drink that it's named after--in Japan--and it was spelled "ramune" in Romaji on the can, so that's how I'm spelling it here. Oh, if you were wondering, it's great stuff. Kind of like Sprite with extra citrus kick.

The VS Knight Lamune & 40 Fire

WEATHER REPORT GIRL (Jpn: OTENKI ONESAN) Keiko Nakadai When Michiko Kawai, the evening weather girl at ATV, needs to take a night off so she can attend a friend's wedding, she searches the station for someone unspectacular to take over for the day's slot, and finds Keiko Nakadai. That should be that, right? Well, as it turns out, Keiko is actually quite stunning (not to mention cunning), and causes a huge stir (and an increase in the station's ratings) when she lifts her skirt and shows her panties during the broadcast. As a result, she is given the slot permenantly, Michiko is shuttled to the 6 AM slot, and the fur starts flying. Not only is Keiko pure, unvarnished evil, but her devil-may-care attitude means that she frequently opens her blouse or otherwise exposes herself at the least provocation, almost always accompanied by a jiggle and the embarrassment of all those around her. A very comical commentary on how cutthroat the broadcasting industry can be.

The only page I can find is this review at