Recommended Avoidance: Avenger December 17
Avenger chalks up as my least favourite anime that I’ve ever been able to fully sit through. At times I considered why I was watching it, why I was wasting disk space on it, and why I couldn’t bring myself to hit the delete key and empty my recycle bin. Now that I’ve finished it, I still wonder and will never receive an answer, because even after viewing everything it has to offer, I have nothing positive to say about it.
Avenger begins with a bleak outlooking Mars. You soon realize that there are only character archetypes in this series, with each character being identical to several others. You’ve got: the old warriors who talk about destinies that are meant to occur and can be overcome (sentences later they realize that everything they’ve ever done was futile,) a mysterious woman who talks about the fate of the planet, rowdy teens who strike out a living in strange occupations, from Doll Breeder to Barbaroi fighter to farmer, and the nameless townsfolk who seem to have no idea what they’re doing in society and just end up complaining to the featured characters.
The fact that I had to use key terms that don’t really exist in reality is proof that the writers had no idea what they were actually writing about. On Mars, apparently people can’t give birth. Why? Fate, maybe even destiny or a fated destiny. It’s never explained. So, robotic children called Dolls are created and are registered to adults to replace them. Because the townsfolk in this show are utter trash, they treat the Dolls like crap and complain later when they break down or get “murdered” for getting in the way of a main character’s battles against the endlessly-spawning hooded Dolls with point-ended Buddhist staves containing hidden katana that seem to have nothing to do but follow someone across the planet.
This leads to Doll Breeders. Doll Breeders are people that…Are never explained in the series. Main character Speedy, is a Doll Breeder. You would first think that they would explain his occupation considering he follows the female lead around through-out all 13 episodes, but it just doesn’t happen. He can hack Dolls and cause them to ignore the main characters’ presence using what looks like an MP3 player with piano keys attached to it, and the device doubles as a taser and lockpick. He can also change the registration data for Dolls for various Deus Ex Machina purposes. I would totally buy one of those if the features actually made enough sense to be contained together within a single hand-held device.
This is roughly the illustration of the society that exists within Mars’ “domes.” People just getting by with no real reason to live, and no valid occupations. Outside of the domes is a wasteland where Barbaroi roam. What’s a Barbaroi? They’re never explained. Apparently some of them are fighters and some of them aren’t. The main character, Layla Ashley, is a Barbaroi fighter. In the first episode she appears to have been hanging out in Speedy’s town, fighting the local champions. Soon enough, another Barbaroi arrives in town looking to fight the strongest person, and is lead into a battle against Layla by a trashed Doll. After Layla wipes the floor with him, it’s obvious just how bleak the outlook on Mars’ society is, when a gun is pointed at the loser’s head. For no obvious reason, the fighter is spared and vows to kill Layla later in the series; always a reason to spare a person’s life. As hijinks are meant to ensue, Speedy, Layla and Nei head out into the wastelands of Mars. Wait, what? Why? Oh right, this is Avenger.
Basically the anime progresses with Speedy and Nei (the trashed Doll that lead the Barbaroi to Layla) following Layla around. Layla’s not even doing anything. You might have expected my last sentence to end with “following Layla around as she…” followed by an amazingly detailed review of an epic quest of roguery and treasure-hunting or a tiered list of the various amazing fighters that she battles during her reign of terror as New Mars Champion, but it all boils down to her merely existing for 13 episodes. Surely enough, enemy Barbaroi attack her, the hooded Dolls appear several times to hunt down Nei and there’s even an entire episode spent without showing the trio for a single frame. The writers have the concept of “formula” down, that’s for sure.
The so-called antagonists are The Original Dozen, the 12 people responsible for the colonization of Mars after leaving Earth behind. Now you’re already thinking “Oh hey, I bet this is where the tiered list he mentioned is going to appear” and surely enough, you’re completely wrong! There are only 5 of The Original Dozen left in the time period that the anime shows, the others are shown in a single picture, but are never actually named or mentioned, so it’s impossible to know what actually happened in the past. The last piece of the story, apart from Layla’s journey and the aspect of a crippled society, involves these characters.
Volk, the obvious leader of the dozen, is a cyborg-looking man who is the reason for Layla’s quest. Or is he? Layla never seems to make up her mind, but she’s always brooding and angry. I guess he killed her family when he shot down her spaceship. Or something. He claims that she came from Earth just before claiming she was raised on the Moon. Wait, when did we have a society on the Moon? It’s never even mentioned in the anime itself. He promptly follows this by bringing up destiny, and how she is the Chosen Child that will cause the Moon to destroy Mars. Or something. Minutes later, he says that Nei is actually the Chosen Child and sends more hooded Dolls after the main characters to kidnap Nei without reason. Is this storyline going anywhere? You’d be quick to wonder.
Soon enough, it’s revealed that the giant red orb in the sky is the Moon. Mars’ moon? Earth’s moon? I hear Layla was raised there. Mars’ moon is pretty big, and is glowing with magma-filled fissures and what looks like strobe lights. Apparently the other of Mars’ moons that exists in reality decided to make a coffee run and isn’t present in this anime.
(Upon research, Bandai’s English site seems to reveal that it is in fact Earth’s Moon that alters the gravitational fields of Mars and Earth, also causing Lunar Storms. Note that it’s also unexplained whether or not Earth is still in existence or abandoned or otherwise.)
Now here’s the kicker, be wary, spoilers lurk in this paragraph. The men of The Original Dozen, all run off to fight Layla and meet their own demise at her hand and die a warrior’s death. When they ran off, they seemed to have something to accomplish, or something to learn. The audience never benefits from this; in fact there’s no point in involving those characters in the first place. One even raised Layla to be a fighter when she first crashed onto Mars’ surface, literally screwing over the other antagonists and the teacher himself. They’re all stupid plot device characters that show us back-story that we never really needed to know if they never existed in the first place.
When Nei is kidnapped for no reason, she is revealed to be a child born of Barbaroi parents (somehow.) She is to be used to find out how the citizens of Mars can give birth again. She was kidnapped BEFORE they had a reason to use her. There is no coherence to this storyline! Before this point, she just looked like the rest of the Dolls. Mechanic ear piece covering part of her head and multi-coloured eyes, despite lacking the distinct lines dividing the parts so joints can be opened up and repaired. Apparently the ear piece was just a cover and the eyes…Were real. How odd. Soon enough Nei falls ill, even when rescued by Speedy and Layla, and her hair changes from blonde to pink (since most actual people do this.) While Layla succeeds in meeting her goal of revenge against Volk (Oh, so she did have a reason after all. Guess they had to give the series title a meaning.) Nei’s illness begins to worsen until her eyes change colour from yellow and pink, to both being pink, and her hair gets a bit curly.
This anime literally concludes with this amazing line: “Oh yeah, Nei was just sexually immature.” GREAT GUYS! JUST GREAT! I FORGOT THAT JUST BEFORE PUBERTY WE HAVE TO SUFFER FROM A LIFE-THREATENING ILLNESS AND HETEROCHROMIA
Apparently to prove that humans can live on Mars, a Barbaroi had to give birth first. “This way, no children had to be born in the domes” is not the thing to say when your next generation, and entire race is in danger of extinction, but it is needlessly stated. Because Nei finally hit puberty, the apocalypse subsided and the people of Mars were allowed to live on again in their own ways, newly ravaged by the Moon. “Screw you guys, I’m going back to the wasteland” is the phrase Layla utters as she anti-climactically decides to not care about anything that happened across the series and just wanders off past the screen’s side. That’s the last thing she ever says. Fade to credits and cue long stride into the distance.
That is not what I’d call a good morale or ending to any story.
Now for the production faults of Avenger:
Music: ALI PROJECT is a the go-to group if you want some great gothic-sounding tunes. They deliver a great OP and ED set that fit the series and footage perfectly. However, they are then called back in to do the background music. I never thought I’d say this, but ALI PROJECT successfully delivered the worst musical experience I’ve ever heard in an anime. Every track consisted of booming techno, brass instruments or organ music that grated the ears and didn’t fit the mood of the scenes at all. Every time Volk is shown, a certain organ theme plays that goes from loud to quiet, to silent, to so loud it muffles all of the character dialogue. Every time a fight scene occurs, a nice techno track that would work great as an RPG battle theme plays for the 10 second exchange of blows before an antagonist theorizes for 5 minutes about why Layla is fighting. Late in the series, one character takes a ride on a train. They’re the only person on the car. They’re sitting and staring at the seat opposite them, not saying a word. The loudest, most unorganized techno music I’ve ever had the displeasure to listen to starts pounding out of my speakers with so much bass I feared for my ear drums. Did ALI PROJECT even know what they were making music for? This music should be played in night clubs and raves, not in any form of televised media.
Acting: There’s little I can say about the acting. I can only imagine how much better the dub could be, with Wendee Lee directing. This is probably the worst presentation a Japanese company has ever set up. For what dialogue there is, it’s basically filled with slow-paced rambling about fate, or the female lead speaking 2 words at a time with no change in pitch or emotion across the series. It’s past the point of admiration, where it seems like she naturally has such a lack of talent that she is expressionless.
Speedy’s a silly guy. He’s cool.
Animation: I’ve been able to enjoy previous Bee Train productions, such as the .hack anime tie-ins and Murder Princess. They had a great balance of mystery, dialogue and action. Avenger consists of 1% action, 0% mystery and 4% dialogue. The remaining 95% of the entire series, as produced by Bee Train, consists of: you guessed it! Camera pans over eyes, faces, landscapes and freeze-frames during battle. For each line of dialogue there are roughly 10 art stills that the camera will pan over between the lines. It was actually somewhat nauseating, and I just wanted some goddamn fluid motion or a few simple still shots as two characters discussed something remotely interesting.
I suppose it’s also worth pointing that out Bee Train’s interest in strong independant women (usually with guns) utterly failed this time, because instead of being strong, Layla actually came off as kind of weak and whiny (comparable to Sasuke in the later episodes of Naruto) while maintaining a calm, silent, “I have no reason for acting this way” attitude, devoid of emotion, that makes her appear as sort of an ass.
Basically, if you have a fetish for Mars, there’s little I can do to stop you from watching this animated abortion, but if you have any taste, you’ll be so repulsed by the first episode that you’ll actually be able to stop yourself from watching it. I have suffered for your sake, please make use of my sacrifice.
To continue that note and deliver an “educational” conclusion, here is the first episode’s battle. Once you’ve seen one fight, you’ve seen them all; the first episode is the only thing that doesn’t break the series, so this should be enough to sate your curiosity without interesting you in Avenger. Initially it looks like the combat could be impressive, but most of it consists of a swipe, a dodge, a hit, then dialogue. This fight illustrates it well, and is the only time music actually works together with the scene.