Tantalizing with the ideas of family fun, Sleazy Family is actually a fairly tame little romp.

What They Say:
Everyone knows that the family that plays together, stays together. Especially when it’s a sleazy family! Masaru walks in on his Aunt Miyuki and catches her in an intimate moment. At first, he tries to run away, but Miyuki entices him to stay. When Masaru’s step-mom (Miyuki’s sister) sees what they’re up to, she just has to join in! Meanwhile, over at the hamburger shop, kinky doings are transpiring. The manager likes to administer sexy punishments when his female clerks break the rules. Eventually, Masaru is invited to the party and finds a family affair waiting for him.

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release brings us one that’s fairly straightforward with a pair of stereo mixes encoded at 192kbps. It isn’t one that really has that much of a workout to it as it’s a pretty center channel based mix that doesn’t utilize anything in the way of depth or directionality. With little music to the show, there are only some standard world background noises at times beyond the dialogue and sex sounds, so the mix suits it well enough. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in late 2005, the transfer for this two episode OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The series is one that has a bit more of a digital look to it that’s reminiscent of shows from a few years prior but not to the point where it’s so layered that it’s unnatural. The authoring job runs around in the mid sevens for the bitrate for most of it and that’s about what the show needs to maintain a fairly clean look, though it does fall into a fair bit of noise with some of the backgrounds and a bit of aliasing during the panning sequences. Nothing here really stands out in either a good or bad way but rather just fairly competent and generally problem free.

Packaging:
As Kitty generally does, Sleazy Family takes a nod from popular culture by tying itself in satirical fashion to the Brady Bunch. The cover uses the nine-panel breakdown and showcases the main cast throughout it, though there is a bit of repetition along the way since the female cast is small with only four characters. They do at least use the popular tagline along the top of “The family that plays together, stays together,” which is just ideal. The cover does look very appealing with its attractive character designs and the poses and outfits used for them. The back cover uses a similar layout in the center with shots from the show throughout it while two of the blocks are used for an awkward laid out summary of the show. None of the shots are explicit but there’s certainly more than enough implied in them. The bottom is fairly standard with basic production information and the always solid technical grid.

Menu:
The menu design keeps in theme with what the front cover was but here it uses one shot in that’s cut up into the nine blocks which feature Miyuki and Saori together. The background and colors work well and it has the logo mixed into the background in several places as well which is cute and adds a bit of the “Addams Family” feel to it. The menu doesn’t have much to it for navigation since it’s just the show, scenes and languages outside of a few trailers for other shows. The menu does look quite good though even if it does fail on the basic language presets as is the norm for Kitty releases since the sign/song subtitle track is the first English language subtitle track.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Sleazy Family leaves me speechless on a few fronts and I’m not sure where to start. Oh, that’s a lie. I have to start with the shows creative staff, such as the listing that the series planning was done by Captain Akiyama. How can you not like that kind of name? How can you go wrong with a Captain? The other part that got me laughing – and worried – from the start was the mention in the opening credits before anything is going on, that this is the directors’ first work. Hotaru Kawano out does Kevin Smith in self-importance in this department but it left me just dreading the show that was to follow since you expect little from first-time directors like this.

Sleazy Family has an odd episode design to it in that each of the two episodes is broken up into three parts. That’s not a bad thing on its own, but they’re done with full opening and closing credits for each of them, which basically pads the whole thing out even further than it should be. A fifty minute combined runtime is now padded out to sixty-six minutes because of it. It also adds to that air of self-importance that the opening credits gave off, but the worst part is that it’s done to break up the action. Each particular scene is essentially an episode unto itself and that just ruins the overall flow of everything. Instead of moving easily from one scene to the next, bam, there are a couple of minutes of credits for you. Thank you, Kitty, for well-placed chapter marks. The downside, of course, is that on a two episode release, you’re skipping out on a big chunk of show – useless show – that you paid for. Or at least I paid for it.

So what is Sleazy Family about? It’s a giant tease. With the tagline on the cover and being called Sleazy Family, you expect some good taboo family material to be introduced. And we’re certainly teased with it at first when young Masaru is asked by his hot mother to go visit his hot aunt to pick up some stuff she left there. When Masaru arrives at the house, he discovers it locked so he proceeds to peep in the living room window to confirm nobody is home. But surprise, there’s Miyuki getting herself all hot and bothered to a porno she’s got. Unfortunately for her, she’s having nasty thoughts about Masaru at the time and calls out his name, which freaks him out but alerts her to his presence. One thing leads to another and his magical adventure with his aunt begins.

It’s fairly tame wish fulfillment material in its own way and Miyuki is a decent teacher, though she does have some amusing moments where she just lays there and instructs him like a teacher. Not content with just one older woman in the action, Masaru’s mother Saori shows up eventually since Masaru never returned her calls and she discovers what’s going on. It’s here that the show falls apart in part of its premise as Saori reveals that she’s not his real mother, which means Miyuki’s not his real aunt. The taboo part goes out the window at this point even more so because we find out that Masaru reminds Saori of an old flame of hers and she married his father to get to him. There is at least some familial love going on here when the two sisters start going at it with Masaru and each other, but you fully expect them to reveal that they’re only sisters by marriage.

The second full episode is laid out in the same way as it’s done as three small stories set within the overall episode. This one retains the Sleazy Family name, though it reboots its number to stories one through three. Amusingly, Kitty thinks we’re idiots and labels the first episode as episode four with the subtitles, cause we couldn’t be sure it was a continuation without it. The related aspect of the two stories takes a bit to be revealed as the show changes venue to a “Hamberger Shop” where we’re introduced to Lena, the hot busy young cashier girl. She’s getting overtime on the side by servicing the manager who has quite the toy and fetish streak going with her. When she’s not taking care of him, Lena is all over her friend Ayaka, the traditional girl with glasses who hates guys but can’t help being in love with… you guessed it, Masaru.

Ayaka and Lena’s tryst gets discovered and the manager decides he needs to put them both through special training. And unfortunately, this is where the second episode feels its weakest as the sex here just doesn’t titillate much. There isn’t much attractive about the manager shoving a wad of French Fries into Lena and then putting his member into them. Mysteriously, he’s ready for anything apparently and whips out a candle to stick into Ayaka and he even has a pair of blindfolds ready. The sex for the second episode is just unbalanced in this way and it’s fairly mediocre at that. The first episode isn’t a major winner in comparison to many other shows, but it’s the better of the two episodes on this volume. With that one, Masaru gets to deal with older women who know what they’re doing, have a certain confidence and even a good bit of style as they bring out some fun lingerie. With the shop girls, it’s just wham bam stuff that has things happening that just don’t make sense. Even for a porno.

In Summary:
The two series that make up Sleazy Family, Inbo and Inko, really don’t have a lot to offer. The opening story is passable at best but it cops out on the real titillation that’s promised. The second episode is weak in how it ties to the first story for a bit and it features uninteresting characters and poorly orchestrated sex scenes, scenes that an amateur porn fic writer could probably do better with. Kitty Media has done a good job with the release overall and they’ve certainly marketed it quite well even if the show doesn’t quite follow through on the promise of what we’re teased with. But that’s half of what porn is all about so it’s not too much of a surprise. There isn’t much here that was all that engaging, but if there’s one to buy it for, it’s the first story which at least has some family relations, good character designs and some girl on girl action.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C-
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B+
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: Kitty Media
Release Date: April 29th, 2008
MSRP: $29.98
Running Time: 60 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Slight Fever Syndrome is one of the lighter more humorous hentai titles that features mostly consensual situations and no tentacles.

What They Say
Some of life’s lessons, tuition just can’t buy! The beautiful Miss Mizuki works at a private college, counseling students and teachers alike. With student after student confiding in her, telling of their secret passions and erotic escapades, nurse Mizuki has a hard time controlling herself!

Contains both parts of Slight Fever Syndrome in one great package!

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this series comes with the original Japanese language track in stereo and and English language dub, both of which are encoded at 192kbps. Throughout the show, we didn’t notice any issues with this audio track as it sounded pretty clear. It’s mostly just dialogue and moans (and some rather good ones in the English track as well) which are center channel based. Some of the music makes good use of the full soundstage, but there’s hardly anything here that’s calling for any kind of directionality.

Video:
Originally released in 1997 and 1998, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. Animated by Knack Productions, it’s the kind of show that’s definitely showing its age in source materials and the original encoding about fifteen years ago. On our setup we got a lot of cross coloration on the screen. It was practically all over the character animation throughout the entire disc. But giving it a spin on our low end system with just a regular video cable and it doesn’t show those problems (but it also looks considerably softer as well). Barring that problem however, the disc looks pretty good with only a few areas that looked soft and slightly pixellated.

Packaging:
The cover for this works good, presenting the usual lustful image of a schoolgirl in her uniform. Various pictures in photograph form lay in the background, and overall gives a good glimpse at the show. The back cover provides several more photograph style pictures and some color shots as well. The summaries for the shows are decent, though they both sound practically alike. The insert makes use of the pictures on the back to display the chapter listings while the reverse side is just boxart ads.

Menus:
The menu system is very minimal here, as there’s not much to do here beyond set up for the show and then watch it. Moving between the menus is nice and fast and everything works good.

Extras:
There were no extras included on this disc.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Originally known as Binetsu Shoukougun and made up of two OVAs that run just under forty minutes each, Slight Fever Syndrome is a fairly mediocre real-world hentai title. It’s got some bits of comedy, some decent hentai situations, and some passable character animation.

The show revolves around Miss Mizuki, the newly hired nurse/counselor at a private junior college. She’s there to help the college students deal with occasional issues and make sure they’re all a-ok. But things are just a bit more intense here than she was probably expecting, when her first visitor is a young student who just blurts out that she wants Miss Mizuki to teach her how to masturbate.

The show then moves between teacher/teacher relationships that Mizuki helps out, to more students wanting some tender touches from the doctor and with another teacher who finds himself becoming interested in Mizuki. The show basically sets up some little bits between each of the acts to move things along. There’s not a lot of depth here, but enough so to keep the story moving from scene to scene.

This is also a show worth checking out in both languages. The English version is almost trippy at times. Unfortunately, one of the first things they did in changing the dialogue (dramatically so at times) is to change the names. Miss Mizuki now becomes Miss Moore. Mr. Endo becomes Mr. Smith. Oh boy. There’s also a lot of accents used here, with the strongest one being the southern girl. Especially when she informs her friends that she’s slept with over a hundred other girls (a line that never appears in the sub). Of course, there’s also lines in the sub that aren’t dubbed at all and are just replaced with moaning.

In Summary:
Slight Fever Syndrome isn’t a bad show, but it’s done a bit on the cheap side for the animation. The comedy works better in the English side, but some of the changes are just annoying. This’d be a good rental for the desperate late night anime fan.

Features
Japanese Language, English Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: D
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: Kitty Media
Release Date: October 23rd, 2001
MSRP: $29.99
Running Time: 75 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Extra credit classes that involve role-play about the career you may want ends up leading into many sexual trysts.

What They Say:
Although Daisuke is a relatively new teacher to the school, he has quickly become popular with both his students as well as his peers. He conducts a extra credit lesson based on allowing students to role play what they may be considering for their careers upon graduation. Some say that this course may just be an excuse to spent more time with the girls and the girls most certainly have more on their mind than just seeing him in class. Based on a popular game by Crossnet-Pie, JapanAnime proudly presents boin lesson 1!!

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language track in stereo and encoded at the usual 192kbps that you find with adult releases. The stereo mix for it is essentially what you expect from an adult release in that it’s clean and problem free during regular playback. The stereo mix itself doesn’t have much in the way of noticeable directionality which is pretty normal and overall it sounds like a standard full forward soundstage presentation.

Video:
Originally released to video in 2005, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for this are in the best shape they probably will be and the actual presentation uses so many bright and vibrant colors that this just shines in general. With only one episode on the disc the rates are high which accounts for some very smooth and block-free backgrounds and large areas of a single color. The color palette for the backgrounds are fairly standard school style but the character designs come through with some great colors that stand out. The show looks clean and smooth throughout and we didn’t see any problems such as aliasing or cross coloration.

Packaging:
Going with the highly attractive shot of Noa in a wedding gown but the top removed, the colors just stand out here, particularly with her hair and the cherry between her lips that just draw you in even more. The design and details look great and this is just one of many gorgeous adult anime covers that seem to blow away mainstream releases. The back cover provides a number of shots from the show that are clean and without any real nudity while providing a summary of the premise in between them. The bottom is filled out with the basic legal jargon and the technical grid. As usual, there is a reversible cover through the front portion is essentially the same. The back cover for the reverse side has the same layout but a different set of pictures that show off several of the sex scenes.

Menu:
Using the cover artwork along the left half of the menu, the layout is simple but attractive as the music plays bouncily along. The navigation strip along the right side under the logo uses the same color motif and is quick and easy to use though it’s an easy release to leave on the main menu. Access times are nice and fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets and played accordingly.

Extras:
The only included video extra here is an image gallery done in slideshow format. A new extra included and tweaked a good bit since first appearing on Desperate Carnal Housewives is the inclusion of a PSP/iPod video version of the episode. A menu section in the extras describes the method by which to get it in clear detail as well.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Boin is one of those shows from Milky where you have to wonder why such classes don’t exist and why they couldn’t happen like it’s presented here. While the concept of the show is pretty simple and it doesn’t really have a lot of places to go other than doing a bunch of cosplay vignettes of sorts, it’s exactly the kind of light and fluffy adult material that’s much more accessible to folks who aren’t into the hardcore material. The only downside is that it’s the kind of show that likes to go with the larger cup size on girls whose bodies would likely break if they had them. At least it’s not to an obscene level.

The premise in Boin, a word that’s just fun to say, is that the recently arrived new teacher named Daisuke is running a series of extra credit classes. As he’s proven to be a popular and well-received teacher, he works with students on a one on one basis where they basically get to role play a career of their choice to see if they’re interested. His boss provides him with the scripts that they should use for it so that the student can get an idea of how things go in the real world and to see if they like it beyond their supposed vision of what that career is like. For Daisuke, he’s finding that it’s just women he’s been assigned or are the only ones signing up for it and they all seem to have a plan to get him naked.

The opening episode, based on the computer game, covers Daisuke’s interactions with three school girls who want to find their way. The opening one uses the girl from the cover, Nao, as she confesses that while she does want to be a nurse (and is dressed up as such for the private class), she’s really had a crush on Daisuke for some time and uses this opportunity to seduce him. The combination of the outfit and the girls own charm and character design is very appealing and a great way to start it off. The costumes don’t have much time on screen though since they’re often cast side quickly, such as the second student who wants to be a temple maiden or the third instance which allows an adult character to pretend to be a student o have some fun.

The character designs for the show are quite appealing with their vibrant nature and clean looks. Nao, in particular, stands out just because the cover art sets her up so nicely but each of the other characters, while stereotypes in their own way, look good. The show has a very smooth and clean look to it and while the sex scenes are explicit enough they aren’t the types that go too far such as into the scatological area, something that’s actually been toned down in a lot of recent shows compared to a couple of years ago. The sex scenes are good and enjoyable but they are of the lighter fare which people unused to adult shows will be interested in more so than the hardcore fans I think.

In Summary:
While some aspects of the character designs induce a bit of eye rolling, overall Boin is a fun and light little show that has fun with its premise and doesn’t take itself seriously. It has a good mix of attractive characters for the single male lead to get involved with and the several scenes he has with them all play out just right without feeling like they were too short, repetitive or too long. Boin was almost surprising in how much fun it was overall but it’s really a good couples or entry level show more than anything else. Good clean fun and easily recommended.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, Slideshow

Content Grade: B
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: A
Packaging Grade: A
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: B-

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: March 21st, 2006
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

The classes continue but some of the students keep coming back for more than was originally offered.

What They Say:
Daisuke slept with two of his students, Nao and Mutsugu, and he thought things couldn’t get any better. He thought wrong. Now that they both know the other slept with Daisuke, what do they do? Answer: They’ll both do everything and anything it takes to win Daisuke’s heart!

The Review:
Audio:
For our primary viewing session, we listened to this show in its original language of Japanese and it’s also the only language available here. The stereo mix for it is essentially what you expect from an adult release in that it’s clean and problem free during regular playback. The stereo mix itself doesn’t have much in the way of noticeable directionality which is pretty normal and overall it sounds like a standard full forward soundstage presentation.

Video:
Originally released to video in 2006, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for this are in the best shape they probably will be and the actual presentation uses so many bright and vibrant colors that this just shines in general. With only one episode on the disc the rates are high which accounts for some very smooth and block-free backgrounds and large areas of a single color. The color palettes for the various backgrounds are fairly standard school style but the character designs come through with some great colors that stand out. The show looks clean and smooth throughout and we didn’t see any problems such as aliasing or cross coloration.

Packaging:
While it can’t achieve the pure sex that exudes from the first volume, this cover is very hot in its own right as Nao and Mitsugu are pressed up against each other with their tops open. It hits up the gorgeous character designs and enticing views of the naked flesh all while wrapping it up in a schoolgirl outfit. The back cover provides a number of shots from the show that are clean and without any real nudity while providing a summary of the premise in between them. The bottom is filled out with the basic legal jargon and the technical grid. Unlike the previous volume, there is no reversible cover.

Menu:
Using the cover artwork along the left half of the menu, the layout is simple but attractive as the music plays bouncily along. The navigation strip along the right side under the logo uses the same color motif and is quick and easy to use though it’s an easy release to leave on the main menu. Access times are nice and fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets and played accordingly.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The first installment of Boin was one that was enticing right from the start. The cover art made you quiver before you even got the wrapping off of the keepcase. Much like that hot lover you managed to bring home on the cheap, once you got it inside you got everything you wanted from it. Boin delivered in spades even though it was almost achingly simple in its design.

The premise in Boin, a word that’s just fun to say, is that the recently arrived new teacher named Daisuke is running a series of extra credit classes. As he’s proven to be a popular and well-received teacher, he works with students on a one on one basis where they basically get to role play a career of their choice to see if they’re interested. His boss provides him with the scripts that they should use for it so that the student can get an idea of how things go in the real world and to see if they like it beyond their supposed vision of what that career is like.

Since starting the class, Daisuke has hooked up with a couple of his students but has managed to keep them from learning about each other. The girls are still very much interested in him and didn’t view the first times as a one class effort. When he returns to his room, Daisuke is surprised to find Nao there in just an apron. But what really surprises him is that she found a box that he supposedly won in a contest some time ago that has a rotating sex toy in it. Since she’s in something of a housewife mode, he goes to town on her with the punishment that he thinks would be proper for any housewife who snuck a look at her guys’ packages.

As much fun as the two of them end up having together, it ends with them being discovered by Mitsugu who has come by to try another shot at her favorite teacher. The girls find that they’re both very competitive over Daisuke, who after all has treated them pretty well, and Mitsugu decides that she’ll show him that she’s far better than Nao ever could be. Nao actually backs off to let this happen for a bit but the situation eventually pushes her into getting in on the action. And what could bring two young women closer together than straddling the same guy?

Just like the first episode, the animation quality here is pretty solid and the designs are winners. While it may not be the most fluid of shows, the action itself keeps you plenty glued to the screen and enjoying what’s going on. With no dirty tricks, no bizarre fetishes and no scatological material, this is good clean fun for everyone really. There isn’t a lot to the show itself, the plot is obviously paper thin, but it’s enough to justify the events and keep it all tied together. The knowing of who the characters are is what adds some of the spice to it all.

In Summary:
When Boin first came out it was a real surprise of a title in just how good it was. It wasn’t another pretty cover with lackluster or disturbing material inside. It’s a title that was good both as an introduction to adult material but also one that could readily please someone who has seen a lot. This second installment naturally lacks some of the innocence of the first one in that we know the plot and the how of it all, but we do get some simple good solid sex scenes with attractive characters. This is a title that I can easily recommend across the board to anyone interested in something spicier than the usual fanservice teases.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: B
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: A
Packaging Grade: A-
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: November 21st, 2006
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Friends are the best.

Creative Staff
Story/Art: Mikarin

What They Say:
Swollen juicy postponement time ♥

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Originally serialized in Comic X-Eros from the July 2017 installment, Friend x Love is a twenty-four page story from creator Mikarin, who has no other works on the service. This marked my first experience with this particular creator (and magazine) and it’s one that I can definitely see myself returning to. Mikarin’s style is one that in some ways almost feels a little rough and unfinished but it completely fits the material. What impressed me the most though was how easily they made it all connect here by giving us a few pages of actual character moments before going all in on the sex. That made it so that you had a sliver of something to connect to and that made the actual engagement of bodies all the more fun to watch.

The story focuses on a pair of college students that live at a nearby dorm as Manami has come after work to check up on Yuuki. He’s a bit despondent after a drunken confession to a fellow classmate went poorly with a flat rejection and he’s just not up for things. Manami’s his childhood friend, however, so she’s brought beer and is someone easy to commiserate with. The two of them just hanging out in his room as he talks about things and she reveals a few things about herself makes for a really good lead up. Yes, it’s all simple and minimal, but it provides easy access filling in points for readers to draw from their own experiences (or hopes) so they can connect with the material. When Manami finds a little bit of courage and makes a move on Yuuki it doesn’t take long before they both go in all the way.

When the story shifts to the sex itself it definitely works well. Mikarin’s character designs are really great as I love how they present Manami even if she’s just a little bit too much of a sexpot in some ways. It’s reminiscent of Adam Warren’s style to some degree. While the sex is fairly traditional with nothing over the top out of the norm from the vanilla side of things, there’s a lot to like with it as it’s two long time friends discovering that they really click in this area as well. The panels are wonderfully laid out and with Yuuki taking a background position for a lot of it the focus on Manami is just spot on. Mikarin really has what comes across as a love of this character in how they present her and it just comes through the page beautifully. There are lots of attractive characters in hentai manga but some just speak to you in a way that others don’t and Manami in this one definitely did for me.

In Summary
Mikarin is definitely on my to-follow list now as this chapter just clicked wonderfully for me. It’s one that tells a story with a beginning, middle, and ending, but I’ll be damned if I don’t want to see more of this couple. At the same time I want to see more of what Mikarin can do with their style and approach. The artwork is fantastic here and I love that it got twenty-four pages in order to tell an expanded story that lets you invest in the characters, which in turn made the sex itself all the more engaging. Very good stuff that left me grinning from ear to ear, and a little hot and bothered, by the end.

Content Grade: B+
Art Grade: A-
Text/Translation Grade: B+

Age Rating: 18+
Released By: FAKKU
Release Date: July 2017
MSRP: FAKKU Subscription

When a virgin teacher gets his first taste of a young woman, not only does he desire more but so does she.

What They Say:
Ryuji Shibui, known also as The Squid, is a very strange man. He has never dated anyone and is, in fact, still a virgin. But his lifestyle is about to change thanks to the mischeif of Ayumi Amakawa, a cheerleader.

After getting a “taste” of pleasure that can only be experienced through sex, his ambition now grows with excitement at the idea of finding another girl to have sex with. How far will The Squid go to fulfill his desires?

The Review:
Audio:
For our primary viewing session, we listened to this show in its original language of Japanese. It’s the only language track included here as once again there’s no dub for a new adult release. The track is a fairly standard stereo mix with a bit of directionality across the two channels that sounds decent if not terribly immersive. Dialogue is mostly center channel based but it comes across clean and clear and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2004, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. Similar to several of the better-produced series out there, the source material here looks good with lots of bright vivid colors and some decent animation that doesn’t show too many shortcuts. The colors generally look good and solid though there are some areas where you can see the color gradient but it is a fairly small issue all told and most likely not noticeable on most setups. A few of the mid range shots have a bit of aliasing going on around some of the characters, but this tends to stem more from the reds used as the background going up against the maroon in the characters school uniforms. Generally, this is a good looking transfer with only a few very small areas that will stand out for some.

Packaging:
The front cover has a fairly standard image but a nicely illustrated one of one of the girls being accosted from behind by the teacher as her clothes start to fall away from her. She’s got that blushing stop/don’t stop look to her and the bland but almost creepy green shaded background accents the colors of her uniform nicely. The back cover provides a couple of rows worth of small shots from the show and has a taped on handwritten note that provides the summary for what the series is about in a rather cute way. The remainder of the cover is given over to the production info and the technical grid along the bottom that covers the details. The reverse side shows the front cover as it originally appeared where the skirt is hiked up more and you can see him grasping at her underwear while the back side doesn’t bother with the pictures but rather goes with the premise and a really nice set of illustrations of the two women in mild bondage.

Menu:
The menus are well done here as it uses some of the character artwork from the reverse side back cover of Ayumi in bonds with a red cloud morphing behind her as some of the instrumental music plays along. The colors and clarity of the image are great here and the layout is straightforward and simple to use with the navigation strip along the bottom. Worth mentioning here since it’s less of an extra in my mind but a piece of navigation is that they also include the sex scenes only filter so you get just that when selected. With no languages on here besides Japanese, the player picked up the right subtitle track per our presets with ease.

Extras:
The only included video extra here is an image gallery done in slideshow format. Also included is a PSP version of the movie which you can find via the DVD-ROM side of playback.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
After Class Lesson is the latest from the folks at Milky where they once again visit the hallowed halls of the school and do what every single school based adult anime seems to do; ring those bells right at the start of the show just so you know where it’s taking place. There’s something to be said for standard cliches like that in shows like this.

The story focuses on an older teacher named Shibui, an apparent virgin in glasses who hasn’t in all his years had any real taste of a woman. He spends some of his time in the classroom when nobody else is there watching videos and pictures of schoolgirls getting it on and masturbating with clothing he’s got, presumably from the lost and found. Shibui’s definitely a bit of an odd duck around the school but even worse he’s not a respected teacher in the slightest nor has he been able to propel many of his students to better heights from his teaching so he’s not a favorite of the administration either. In fact, he’s told early on that unless things pick up for his students that he’ll be finding himself looking for employment elsewhere.

When one of his students, Ayumi, ends up in his room over an issue with the tests, he decides to finally just break loose from his usual methods of watching and looking at people and hits her with the salts that put her to sleep. This lets him start down the road of taking advantage of Ayumi, something she, of course, resists when she wakes up to find him all over her. But along the way, she ends up realizing just how good he is and finds herself wanting more and more of it. She becomes so enthralled with bedding him that she’ll even go out to get other girls for him since he wants to expand his knowledge of women. He gets Ayumi to film him with another of the girls that he’s able to blackmail since she’s sleeping with one of the other teachers. More and more is all he wants and the virginal teacher now finds himself not only with a star actress in the school but also the cheerleader at the same time, both of them realizing how much they want him the more they get to experience him.

The show has a rather soft feel to it which is enhanced by the kinds of settings that most of the scenes take place in, such as a hazy sunset on the roof, mildly lighted rooms inside the school and the darkness of a gym storage room. The lighting gives everything the same kind of feel and it works for the most part as it takes some of the edge off of the designs and the vibrant colors that they’d be otherwise. The character designs for the girls are very appealing with their standard models that are given over to really nice outfits and overall detail. Even the teacher isn’t that bad since he doesn’t come across as some of the creepier ones we’ve seen in other shows. Someday though they’ll have to give us an attractive male teacher, won’t they?

JapanAnime also continues to get an extra nod for their translation of the end credits into English. Often these are left either in Japanese or sometimes cut out altogether, so going the extra distance is definitely appreciated.

In Summary:
After Class Lesson was a bit of a surprise since it’s a fairly straightforward show with some minor quirks. What was surprising was more of what wasn’t in it, which is any really serious level of bondage or waterworks. What we get is a show that takes the standard creepy teacher motif and lessens it a bit and has the girls actually interested in the guy after they realize his prowess. There’s a dark edge to it but it’s sort of kept to the side with the focus on the sex in some very moodily lit areas. After Class Lesson just turned out to be more fun than I expected.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, Slideshow

Content Grade: B
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: C+

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: January 17th, 2006
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Sex in school is cool. Especially when it involves a magical penis totem.

What They Say:
Certain subjects being taught at college aren’t necessarily on the curriculum. Sex education is one of them. At an all-girls school, one male teacher takes it upon himself to educate his students in the ways of carnal knowledge. Using (and abusing) his authority, he lures his hottest students into his lair and has his sleazy way with them. By the end, these girls will learn some lessons they’ll never forget.

At another college, a glowing, phallus-shaped artifact possesses magical powers that turn innocent girls into raging sex maniacs. When a teacher is seduced by one of the students, he becomes possessed and soon finds himself with powers that his female students can’t resist.

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release is done up with the original Japanese language track in stereo as well as the English language dub, both of which are encoded at 192kbps. Study-A-Broad is like most other Kitty Media titles in that it does receive a bilingual release since at some level porn does continue to sell. The stereo mix for each track is a fairly standard in design and serves the material well enough as it’s a basic center channel/full mix. There’s little to the show outside of some incidental music and sound effects here and there and the dialogue itself. Nothing stands out but there wasn’t anything wrong with it either, and we had no problems during regular playback of either language track.

Video:
Originally released in 2007, the transfer for this two part OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The transfer for this is pretty solid and Kitty Media uses some high bitrates at times to give things a very solid looking presentation. Outside of a few scenes early on in the first episode which looks to be intentionally soft, the majority of this show simply looks clean and solid. Colors are bright and vibrant and they maintain a solid feel throughout outside of a few bits of noise here and there with some basic school wall colors which always seem hard to keep stable. Cross coloration is absent and there’s only a touch of aliasing during a few pans here and there.

Packaging:
Kitty’s covers tend to be quite good and this one is no exception as it features Yuzuki with her school uniform falling off of her as she looks to the side. The indistinct reddish background keeps all attention on her which is titillating without being revealing. The logo is nicely done with a school theme to it and overall this is a very appealing erotic cover that doesn’t utilize a lot of heavy sex to sell it. That’s what the back cover is for as it has numerous shots from the show across it which gives you a better idea as to the kind of sex in it. The summary runs through the middle of it and it covers the basic plots of the two episodes on the disc clearly enough without listing names. He bottom portion is given over the production credits and the technical grid which clearly lists exactly what’s on it, though they do get the runtime off by about twenty minutes which is hard to forgive. No inserts are included nor is there a reversible cover.

Menu:
Like many Kitty Media releases, the menu design takes the cover artwork and actually uses it to good effect. Yuzuki is shown here once again but it’s a fuller image of her and the colors all look more vibrant and inviting. The navigation strip is pretty straightforward with the basic selections and the inclusion of the same logo as the front cover ties it all together nicely alongside a bit of music from the show. Submenus load quickly and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets and played accordingly.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Study-A-Broad is a cute little two part OVA series that’s made up of very different shows, with Eisai Kyoiku and Seisen Gakuen being the original names. The plus side is that they’re mostly made by the same people so there are similarities to be found. The downside is that each episode is barely twenty minutes each so it’s another pair of very short stories that don’t get a chance to really shine and show what they can be.

The first episode is a rather potentially dark piece as it introduces Shin Kagami, a newly arrived teacher in the “university” who has a bit of a reputation behind him. If not for the sponsoring behind him, the assistant principal seems like she’d be ready to call the police on him instead. Shin’s rather crafty in a perverse way about ensuring his position in the school, however. Before she knows it, Shin is kissing her and stripping her down so he can have his way with her. All while getting photographic proof that would destroy her career and life easily enough. She’s stunned by it all and, in true adult anime way, gives in to it all too easily and enjoys it the entire time. That’s just how it is of course.

When Shin hits the halls of the university, it’s like watching a wolf in sheep’s clothing going through the herd. The girls are all interested in him because of his looks and he’s just trying to decide who he wants to take first. The victim is a curious one as the beautiful Yuzuki is apparently his sister of some sort going by translation and the small amount of history that the two of them share. It’s very vague in how they came to this, but it doesn’t take long for Shin to properly seduce her and then anally dominate her to his way. Of the two scenes, this one is the longer one and it’s also far more erotic since it’s partially consensual and there’s more engaging “emotion” to all of it.

The second episode has a bit more variety to it but it’s one that takes a bit more of an unusual turn as well. This story involves a relatively recent arrival to teaching in the form of Shinsuke, a bespectacled somewhat nervous teacher who is dealing with a heavy load, including being the advisor on the archaeology club and the swim club. He’s put in his place regularly by fellow faculty member Shiori and he’s just not sure of himself. This goes out the window when he stumbles onto Saya, a student from his archaeology club, who is getting off in the club room due to the influence of a mysterious phallic artifact. They get things going pretty well but the artifact ends up causing him to exude “sacred” water from his penis now. Golden showers taken on a truly holy note since Shiroi finds out about it and believes he’s some sort of Chosen One.

The second episode makes out better than the first in some ways as it has a bit more variety sine Shinsukue gets Says, Shiori and a swim club girl named Aya. On the downside, it’s got all the golden showers material as well which just doesn’t appeal all that much. And like the first episode on the disc, it’s incomplete in its own way because it doesn’t actually go anywhere. Of course, most people aren’t looking for a story here, so there isn’t too much of a real issue with it. The series as a whole has some decent character designs but nothing that stands out in a really strong way. Yuzuki is the more appealing of all of them, and she gets the most screen time, but there is something of a mild budget feel to the whole thing as well. With that and the mild and brief sex scenes, it’s not a show that really gets one all that excited unless you really need the golden showers material.

In Summary:
Study-A-Broad is a fun little show but in the end, it’s a bit disappointing since it doesn’t get a chance in either episode to really go far enough with things. The first one is a bit of a tease since it sets up situations but doesn’t get to expand on any of the backstories at all while the second one features “sacred” urination sequences. There are things to like as they both feature some good sex scenes with a bit of diversity and the character designs are appealing for the most part, but they just lack that extra something to make them memorable. It doesn’t help that they’re over far too quickly as well. With the first episode featuring two scenes and the second episode bringing in three, they’re all about the quickies and not in it for the length. It’s not a bad way to kill a little time, but with the pricing and runtime, it’s certainly more of a rental than anything else.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: Kitty Media
Release Date: June 3rd, 2008
MSRP: $29.99
Running Time: 60 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Shibui’s finding himself being challenged by Hayasaka so he has to put in a new plan in order to keep up his bit of fun.

What They Say
The Squid’s ambition continues to grow and he now has his eyes on his enemy, Miss Hayakawa. It’s not going to be an easy battle for him to win, but The Squid has a thing or two up his sleeve, especially when he has his past victims to be his pawns. However, things take a different turn when someone betrays him! Who is the betrayer? Will he conquer his ultimate ambition?

The Review:
Audio:
For our primary viewing session, we listened to this show in its original language of Japanese, which is done up in stereo and encoded at 192kbps. It’s the only language track included here as once again there’s no dub for a new adult release. The track is a fairly standard stereo mix with a bit of directionality across the two channels that sounds decent if not terribly immersive. Dialogue is mostly center channel based but it comes across clean and clear and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2005, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. Similar to several of the better-produced series out there, the source material here looks good with lots of bright vivid colors and some decent animation that doesn’t show too many shortcuts. The colors generally look good and solid though there are some areas where you can see the color gradient but it’s a bit worse when it comes to some of the red heavy backgrounds, especially during the end of the episode. The way it’s broken down almost looks like a vertical interlacing issue. A few of the mid range shots have a bit of aliasing going on around some of the characters, but this tends to stem more from the reds used as the background going up against the maroon in the characters school uniforms. Generally, this is a good looking transfer with only a few very small areas that will stand out for some.

Packaging:
Using the original Japanese artwork and laid out much better than the first couple of installments, this cover looks great with Sano and Tachibana wrapped around each other in their school uniforms while still showing plenty of skin. The back cover provides a row worth of small shots from the show along the bottom just above the technical grid. The production information covers the bulk of those involved in the show and there’s a good summary of what to expect from the episode. Sadly, there was no reversible cover with this particular release.

Menu:
Changing from the first volume as well, the menu here uses the layout of the front cover with a bluish filter thrown over it while along the bottom is a strip of headshots of various girls from the show. The menu selections are done up in nicely that’s easy to navigate and quick to load. Worth mentioning here since it’s less of an extra in my mind but a piece of navigation is that they also include the sex scenes only filter so you get just that when selected. With no languages on here besides Japanese, the player picked up the right subtitle track per our presets with ease.

Extras:
There are no real extras included but they did include the PSP/iPod version of the movie which you can find via the DVD-ROM side of playback.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The After Class Lesson series comes to a close with this volume and it’s one of the better ones that even manages to handle a mild scatological scene in a good way. We’ve seen throughout the show so far that Shibui has managed to bring over a number of girls to his side and has taught them pleasures they never imagined. While we don’t know where he learned all of this (maybe the Internet is good for something after all) we do see that as he’s taken on newer girls, at least one of his original conquests is starting to feel jealous.

Shibui doesn’t have much time to deal with that or even really notice it all that much because he’s got bigger problems. Someone has slipped a picture of him with one of the students to Hayasaka and she’s intent on getting him thrown out. When she confronts him, he simply plays it off as a prank and something that couldn’t happen. Since she can’t do it by herself, she’s got to bring the board into it and that takes a bit of time. Having just had a really great sequence with a bunch of the girls dressed in nun habits, Shibui’s got the perfect team ready and willing to take down Hayasaka and show her the ropes. Well, not literally as no ropes are involved but we find out that she’s been saving herself for marriage.

The taking of Hayasaka is a rather good sequence but it does bring in some cringing moments. One of the things that they do is bring in that enema bottle with the creepy crawlies in it and give her that in both ends. When they do the actual flushing out sequence though, it’s almost all done off screen so you don’t actually see it, just the end result. That may be enough to tip the scales for some. Then again, this show ends on a very disturbing note anyway but that requires some imagination due to a bit of editing that was done. There is a surprisingly brief but really good scene between Shibui and Tenkawa but at its end there’s a still image that’s cropped. When seen, you can imagine easily what’s cropped and it’s surprising that it’s done since I think far more violent things have been left in over the years.

Technically, the disc is in pretty good shape and about where most of the recent releases from JapanAnime have been. Visually it’s got some great moments but some others that make me wonder, but the bulk of it is solid. That said, there’s still a couple of areas that need work but you can tell that they are being worked on. For example, when discussing Hayasaka’s impending marriage, her man is referred to as her “finance”. There’s also an misspelling in the menu where trailers are called trialers. I nitpick on the big companies for things like this, such as when ADV Films listed extras as etras for a couple of volumes so I mention it here as well. But again, compared to some of the earliest releases from JapanAnime, they’ve come a long way and it really shows.

In Summary:
In total, this turned out to be a fairly fun little series that ended stronger than it started, something that I find a rarity in adult shows. Usually once you unwrap the idea it doesn’t have far to go beyond more of the same or moving into something different. While it isn’t all that different from a number of other bad teacher kind of shows that I’ve seen over the years, it felt a bit more focused in what it wanted to do and it really had fun in messing with the girls while not going horrendously overboard in the perversity. Add in that the designs are very attractive and the uniforms are really well done overall and it’s a winning combination. It’s also a series where with each volume you can see how JapanAnime is paying attention and refining their releases. Even with the bit of editing done to this release, After Class Lesson is a title that I’d still recommend checking out.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: B-
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B-
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: August 16th, 2006
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

When Wataru’s memory takes a vacation the only thing that can bring it back is some hands on experience with large breasts.

What They Say
Due to an accident, Wataru has lost his memories. Now he is in America with Rena, and she has promised his parents that she will take care of him until he recovers. Well, she isn’t the only one that wants to help him out! Two boobalicious babes from Japan have followed Wataru to America and they too have vowed to find a way to have his memory recovered. The method: making sure he remembers how much of a boob-lover he once was by using their breasts as tools!

The Review:
Audio:
JapanAnime has kept to its usual practice of just one language track with this release but at least they do it properly. Using the same PCM track as the Japanese release, this language track is encoding at 1.5 mbps. The mix is a simple stereo one without too much in the way of placement or directionality but it is very clean and clear throughout. Dialogue is solid and the more involved noises come across just right. We didn’t have any problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2006, the transfer for this OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. With lots of bright colors and outdoor settings, Boobalicious has a very clean look to it that’s in very good shape. With a high bitrate in general it’s able to avoid most of the usual problems particularly in terms of backgrounds. It has a solid feel throughout with only a few minor instances of aliasing during a pan or some mild motion in a background. Colors look fantastic and color banding is very minimal overall.

Menu:
The main menu has a really amusing kind of instrumental music playing to it that just has me laughing when I hear it for a reason I’m not sure of. The actual layout is decent though again it uses the same character artwork from the front cover. Setting them in front of a barn and hanging the first part of the navigation strip from the logo works well though and gives it a real down home kind of feel. Access times are good in moving about but unlike previous JapanAnime releases the menu transitions introducing a fair bit of noise and other bad effects. Usually their menus are pretty seamless which makes this one stand out more.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
When you see a title named like this and you see the cover artwork where the characters have such large breasts, it’s either going to sing beautifully to its target market or scream horrors for everyone else. Having seen a lot of really bad large breasted adult anime before I had plenty to fear from this release. In checking out a trailer for it on another release however they managed to really pique my curiosity with a couple of things in particular.

Originally released as Milk Junkies Volume 3: Arizona in Japan, the episode revolves around a young man named Wataru. He’s had himself a rather big problem in that an event has caused him to lose his memory. He still seems like a normal guy with no problems but he doesn’t have much memory about himself or anyone that he knows. He’d been vacationing in the US and we see him at the beach in California with an attractive looking blonde. Wataru and Rena aren’t alone though as a pair of large breasted Japanese women are following them. Though only one of them seems to be named, Tomoka and the other know Wataru quite well and have a hard time believing that he’s lost his memory. It’s only when they realize that Rena is small breasted that they believe his amnesia since he’s apparently completely into large breasts.

After a quick montage of the two girls running topless across the beach for no reason, the show picks up with Rena and Wataru back at her ranch in Scottsdale, Arizona. Rena’s responsible for his amnesia and is trying her best to help him out of it and even has his parents permission to do so. She’s got an obvious attraction to him but is more focused on trying to keep him relaxed and sparking his memories. This plan doesn’t work well however when the two Japanese girls show up in some very highly amusing cowboy outfits and inform Rena that only they can bring back his memory. They intend for some hands on instruction for him so that he can really remember what used to get him going.

The plot is obviously paper thin as one would expect in a standalone OVA but the trappings for it work pretty well. It’s obviously different enough from most adult shows out there in its setting and that helps to make it more interesting. What really surprised me about it is just how attractive the character designs are. Each of them have a look that really reminded me of the kind of cheesecake that Adam Hughes draws. Faces are slightly pudgy and soft which is unlike a lot of the more angled and sharper designs that are so prevalent out there. All three of the women come across well even with their breast sizes as they are which was another surprise. Typically the large breasted variety tend to come across badly in that you can’t imagine someone being able to actually walk like that. But here they’re just slightly over the top which makes it easier to deal with.

Another area that really was appealing was the entire costume design aspect. The outfit one of the Japanese girls wears is ridiculous with the starts covering just her nipples but the cowboy hats and chaps as well as the boots is just priceless. Rena is really nicely done as she wears the stripes and stars across a top that goes with her pink cowboy hat. The one that made me laugh the most as well as being the one that got me more interested in the show because it was in the trailer was the cosplay outfit. When Wataru is off milking the cows, one of the girls sneaks into the row by wearing a surprisingly sexy version of a cow outfit complete with the bell. Moo never sounded so hot before. The obvious gags about milking her aside, it was a surprising spark in the middle of a fairly straightforward show that just made me like it all the more.

In Summary:
With this episode, I’m now far more interested in seeing the other Milk Junkies releases that are out there. This episode is quite a bit of fun as it has great looking character designs, some very enjoyable sex scenes and a sense of creativity about it. Even as large as the breasts get sometimes they don’t really intrude like some other titles that I’ve sat through. This release looks great and is just a heck of a lot of fun. With only one episode to the story there isn’t a lot to say but it was a great way to pass a bit of time and is a title I’m eager to share with others.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: B+
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: A-
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B+
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: May 1st, 2007
MSRP: $24.98
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

The girls decide to settle things in a competition that only they can, with the Big Tits Grand Prix. Ain’t America grand?

What They Say:
The Big Chest Grandprix is just around the corner and the girls are pumped! Through this competition the girls have decided that whoever wins will win both the cash prize and Wataru’s heart. Which of these three girls will be the ultimate winner?

The Review:
Audio:
JapanAnime has kept to its usual practice of just one language track with this release but at least they do it properly. Using the same PCM track as the Japanese release, this language track is encoding at 1.5 mbps. The mix is a simple stereo one without too much in the way of placement or directionality but it is very clean and clear throughout. Dialogue is solid and the more involved noises come across just right. We didn’t have any problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2006, the transfer for this OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. With lots of bright colors and outdoor settings, Boobalicious has a very clean look to it that’s in very good shape. With a high bitrate in general it’s able to avoid most of the usual problems particularly in terms of backgrounds. It has a solid feel throughout with only a few minor instances of aliasing during a pan or some mild motion in a background. Colors look fantastic and color banding is very minimal overall.

Packaging:
With a title like Boobalicious you can easily imagine what focus there would be on the cover artwork. Two of the women are shown here set against a desert mesa as they wear the appropriate outfits that all cowgirls wear. Or should wear. The heavy focus on the breasts is an obvious one but thankfully they don’t come across quite as big in the show itself. The soft colors and good looking designs certainly catches the eye and makes you curious as to what’s inside. The back cover pulls in lots of blue skies for the background which makes the yellow summary of the premise a bit difficult to read. Also unfortunate is that they reuse the character artwork from the front cover instead of something new, like Rena. There are a couple of shots from the show that round things out as well as the usual production information and technical grid. No insert is included nor is the cover reversible.

Menu:
The main menu has a fun little ditty to it that fits with the old western style stage that serves as the backdrop. Fumie gets the nod as the character used for this installment and she looks great in the dress against the bright red backdrop. After the first volume, the menu and music for this had me wondering if they were doing an old west story this time. The navigation is simple as it’s just on the curtain in the background but it’s nicely laid out in general, though I am amused that the setup section is listed as “setups.” Access times are good in moving about but unlike previous JapanAnime releases the menu transitions introducing a fair bit of noise and other bad effects. Usually their menus are pretty seamless which makes this one stand out more.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The first volume of Boobalicious, a title that’s just too much fun to write, knocked my socks off considering the expectations I had. Titles generally don’t mean anything for a series, especially on the adult anime world, but something about it just screamed that it wasn’t going to be all that good. Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be the surprise of the year and one of the more enjoyable adult anime shows I’d seen in some time.

The second installment, known as Milk Junkies Episode 4 in its original form, brings us back to the foursome who are still squabbling over who gets to keep Wataru. Poor Wataru just has it so hard in that three attractive busty women want him all for their very own. He’s a typical male lead in that he can’t make a decision, and honestly, in this kind of situation would you really want to? Though it’s tiring him out he’s in a world of heaven with so many large lovely breasts constantly being pushed onto his head. The girls want some sort of closure to the situation however, especially since Wataru has managed to regain his memories.

Things sort of have a way of resolving themselves thankfully and the girls notice that there is a competition in the area that could help settle it. The Big Tits Grand Prix is being held and is open to all to try out for. The trio decides that the one who wins the competition not only gets the ten grand prize but also gets Wataru as the prize. So the girls find themselves as three of the finalists in the competition along with another bunch of girls. They go through the various stages of the competition, though we mostly just see the special talents portion, where you have Fumie doing calligraphy with her breasts and Lean doing some rope tricks that weren’t all that impressive.

Where Boobalicious succeeds, just like the previous installment, is in the actual sex. This show has just as much as the previous one with all three girls getting him during the competition in one way or another. Though the Japanese girls are all in their truly skimpy outfits ” Fumie’s string bikini is so small I swear they didn’t bother to draw the string in some scenes ” they all find ways to entice Wataru as they’re getting on or off the stage. Wataru thankfully is up to the repeated tasks and works hard at them. The best of it though is that they decide on a real foursome for the second half of the episode and as much fun as I had with all the sex prior to this, it’s that foursome that really hits home. When will they learn to just all live together?

One of the things that make the sex scenes so appealing is that the character designs are so appealing. With the numerous big breasted shows that have been brought over, there is a lot to fear when it comes to the “genre.” Boobalicious manages to overcome that with some distinctly different character designs as they’re not necessarily pudgy but they don’t have these razor thin bodies with monstrous breasts. They’re rounded in all the right places and for the most part, especially with the string bikini costumes, almost believable. The softer designs with their rounded features are a stark contrast to most other shows and it gives it a great feeling and an air of realism, or at least as much as you can get with something dealing in a Big Tits Grand Prix.

In Summary:
Defying expectations, and gravity at times, Boobalicious is a real treat on several levels. It’s got great character designs, really fun sex scenes and a simple enough premise by which to pull it all off. And it all comes off during the course of this second episode. Everything about this title is made of pure fun and I can’t recommend it enough. It’s a simple pleasure and the 30 minutes is over before you know but it’s 30 minutes well spent. JapanAnime could use more titles like this in their library and hopefully they’ll get them and hopefully people will buy them. I cannot recommend this enough.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: B+
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: A-
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B+
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: July 24th, 2007
MSRP: $24.98
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

When Sakimi finds herself completely used by someone she had a crush on, her life spirals out of control as the debt racks up.

What They Say:
This hot original manga is authored and written by the infamous mind of Uzuki Nakamura, who’s already renowned world wide for his achievement in realistic yet perverse animes. This new anime, “Cage” will definitely surprise and shock all of you in so many ways.

Cage Chapter 1: Sakimi Endo has finally become Takuya Kakizaki’s girlfriend. She thought this happiness would last forever, but something’s wrong. Her perfect dreams shattered when she was betrayed by her boyfriend and now she has an incredible amount of debt on her. Not being able to pay this off, she’s now forced to become a sex slave to countless strangers in order to pay off the debt. Her life switched instantly from heaven to hell in a blink of an eye! Just when she thought her life is in despair forever, she receives one mysterious mail. This mysterious mail guides her the way she can get out of this nightmare. And of course, she had her worries and doubt at first, but this was the only hope she has been waiting for. So she heads for the club named “Canary” which was written on the mail. When she arrived, the one who was waiting for her behind the door was the owner of the club “Canary”, Amamiya.

Cage Chapter 2: In this chapter, Sakimi Endo becomes very close with Mana Fujido. A strong friendship is bonded between one another; however, their friendship will escalate into love. In this second chapter, there’s a lot more cosplay, fetish, anal, and even double penetration; lots of great sex scenes and fetishes can be seen in a very high quality! This is definitely Hentai anime at its finest.

The Review:
Audio:
As is pretty much standard with JapanAnime releases, this disc only has one language track on it. The Japanese mix is presented in a 2.0 PCM mix which sounds good and has a nice depth to it but not much in terms of actual directionality. Similar to most other adult mixes, it comes across the best with the music but it is generally problem free. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout and we had no trouble with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2003 and 2004, the transfer for this two episode OVA series is presented in its original full-frame aspect ratio. In a lot of ways, this show doesn’t have the heavy digital look to it that a lot of OVAs still retained at that time and seems a bit more traditional. The transfer for this is decent but it has a fair bit of noise in the backgrounds and aliasing during some of the busier scenes. With the way so many JapanAnime titles look so clean, this one feels like it’s a notch or two below their usual standards. It’s not a bad looking transfer but it doesn’t have the firm feel in the colors as their others. Amusingly, even though the show itself is uncensored, the ending sequences with the scenes from the show are censored with mosaics.

Packaging:
The cover design goes for simple but effective as it provides a very nice looking shot of the two lead girls, one in her school uniform no less, in a dank dungeon with very pretty feathers falling around them. The logo takes up a decent bit of space as does the text about the runtime and its origins. Add in the logos and the cover is a fairly busy one that detracts a bit from the attractiveness of the artwork. The back cover works nicely as it uses a black background from which the character artwork blends well. The summary is alongside it which gives it a nice bit of shading while below are a couple of shots from the show. Add in the production information and a solid technical grid and it’s a very good looking design. I am amused that there are multiple mentions outside of the technical grid to highlight that this disc has 60 minutes on it, since it differs from the majority of JapanAnime’s releases. As usual, no insert is included nor is there a reversible cover.

Menu:
The menu layout utilizes the character artwork from both the front cover and back cover to good effect as they blend well. The character artwork from the front cover looks very good here with vibrant colors nd clean lines while the back cover artwork is just right for blending into the background. The logo takes up a good chunk of space just like the front cover and the navigation strip is simple but effective. The disc defaults to just Japanese language with no subtitles though which is unusual since it’s a subtitled only release. Access times are nice and fast and it was easy to get around.

Extras:
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Previously released by JapanX under the Hustler Video label, JapanAnime has given the title a new life with this edition. We had skipped a number of JapanX’s initial releases due to the watermarks on them so we never saw Cage before now. This new release mirrors the original in terms of runtime and content though I’m going to guess that it’s a bit more cleaned up in terms of subtitling in comparison to other early JapanX releases.

Cage is, obviously, a pure and simple domination and control kind of show. The series revolves high school student Sakimi Endo, a young woman who has a big crush on one of the hotter guys in the school. She’s a fairly typical girl in that she’s pretty trusting which means when he talks to her for a few minutes she ignores everything else she has going on. He’s able to take advantage of this by not only taking advantage of her but also her student ID. Without thinking, she lets him use it to get something but he has also pilfered it for another use. While she’s in a post-coital bliss mode, he’s out there racking up huge sums of debt in her name. Before she knows it, she’s responsible for three million yen in debt.

With all of this debt, Sakimi finds herself caught up in a series of sexual situations where she’s basically just whoring to pay it back. She’s fighting against the situation but it just seems to dominate her completely, leaving her hopeless and just going through the motions. The only beacon of light in this new world for her is another woman in the same situation named Mana. The quiet blonde gives her small bits of hope as someone in a similar situation but not much else. Between the two of them, they’re subjected to quite a few sequences where they are completely dominated and controlled. While Sakimi tries to resist, Mana is completely limp to their demands. This makes up the bulk of the show until things begin to change as they must at the end of the second episode.

Like many titles of this nature, the leads in Sakimi and Mana have some good designs to them though they certainly aren’t similar. They’re well animated for the actual sex sequences though there is a fair bit of repetitive motions used. The bad looking side to the designs comes with the male characters as most of them are just ugly or disturbing, something which is only made worse by the comments they make. The design of the show, in general, is pretty good though for what it is as most of the scenes are just interiors that are nondescript. There’s a bit more variety early on when Sakimi isn’t confined which is well done though.

In Summary:
Cage is the kind of title that I’m not really the audience for. There are plenty of those but there are some that can break those barriers and prove to be interesting enough. Unfortunately, this wasn’t one of them though. It is a competent production and the release by JapanAnime is pretty solid for the most part. It’s a good looking disc with some attractive characters and a fairly self-contained plot for what little plot there really is. Fans of the show are likely getting a better version with this release than the old JapanX one though it’s hard to say whether it’s worth the upgrade. Cage is filled with pretty much nothing but non-consensual scenes where the women have little to say about their situation.

Features
Japanese 2.0 PCM Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C-
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B
Packaging Grade: B
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: March 30th, 2007
MSRP: $24.98
Running Time: 60 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

An adult anime five hundred and forty million years in the making! Take that Jurassic Park!.

What They Say:
In the near future, people discovered the true identity of evolution; however, one mad scientist decided to take it further. Dr. Yamagishi was a genius and well-respected – until the day he decided to try human cloning… a forbidden science. Now working deep in the dark, he decides to take his mad plans to the next level: recreating evolution and the Cambrian Big Bang!

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation here is fairly standard as we get the original Japanese language track only and in stereo encoded at 192kbps. The stereo mix for it is essentially what you expect from an adult release in that it’s clean and problem free during regular playback. The stereo mix itself doesn’t have much in the way of noticeable directionality which is pretty normal and overall it sounds like a standard full forward soundstage presentation.

Video:
Originally released to video in 2005, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for Cambrian look to be in great shape as the end result here is a very good looking show with hardly any real problems to it. The design of the show isn’t very vibrant in terms of colors, instead choosing to focus more on dark shades and a lot of black. Flesh tones, especially during the sex scenes, are when you notice the brightest colors and they look really good. Black levels are very well maintained and the transfer has a very smooth feel overall. Add in a lack of cross coloration and aliasing for the most part and it’s a very good looking piece.

Packaging:
Letting you know clearly that this is tentacle porn, which in itself is often fairly violent, Cambrian makes no bones about it as it shows Keiko being surrounded by the tentacles and other creepy crawlies that make up the creatures of this particular age. It’s very dark looking and definitely has a creepy feel though they do give Keiko that bit of a look where you can’t be sure that she’s not enjoying it. The back cover provides a couple of shots from the show that are clean and without any real nudity while providing a summary of the premise in between them. The bottom is filled out with the basic legal jargon and the technical grid. Surprisingly, there isn’t any reversible cover this time around.

Menu:
Using the cover artwork along the right half of the menu, the layout is simple but attractive as the foreboding music plays to it. The navigation strip along the right side under the logo uses the same color motif and is quick and easy to use though it’s an easy release to leave on the main menu. Access times are nice and fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets and played accordingly.

Extras:
The only included video extra here is an image gallery done in slideshow format. Also included is the PSP/iPod video version of the episode. A menu section in the extras describes the method by which to get it in clear detail as well.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
While tentacle hentai has been few and far between the last few years, when they do get around to doing it they often come up a bit creative. Since this particular well has been plundered so many times, there aren’t many things that you can do that hasn’t been seen before. In a lot of ways, Cambrian falls into that trap but they do it with just enough style to differentiate itself from the others that it works pretty well. At least for this first episode.

We’re introduced to the present day to a professor at the University named Keiko, who has a small but decent staff working under her for their research. She’s got a thing going with one of the men she works with, which the virgin-like Shinohara observes by accident while at work, but otherwise she’s a pretty decent person to work with. She can be a bit hard at times if things aren’t going well but at the same time, the job isn’t her life. The fact that she chews out Shinohara for his screw-up and then has little problem going into the next room to get screwed shows that. Shinohara’s definitely the milquetoast in this show though since he completely wusses out when another member of the research staff comes on to him but he freaks out on her.

Shinohara does have a thing for Keiko though and he gets rightly concerned when she gets a call out of the blue from Professor Yamagishi. Yamagishi was a very intelligent professor at the University until he started attempting to clone humans and was run out of the school. Keiko used to be his assistant and was even sympathetic to him after the incident. Enticing her with words of his newest discovery, she heads out to his new laboratory; an abandoned building out the middle of nowhere. Shinohara follows along but he’s not able to do much since Yamagishi gets to her first. Apparently, he’s decided that the real place to search for evolutionary information is in the Cambrian age where things really got underway. He’s even gone so far as to inject himself with what he’s come up with. The good professor is far more than just human now and he wants to share it in a very loving way with Keiko.

Cambrian’s surprisingly violent in ways that I didn’t expect. During a flashback sequence we see Keiko being raped, something that’s shaped her since, but instead of the usual just being grabbed and taken advantage of it’s got her being punched several times. Yamagishi’s attack on another woman has an octopus like creature that’s firmly attached itself to her posterior and it just goes wild on her and turns quite bloody. There’s a level of violence you get used to when it comes to the tentacle stuff but sometimes they manage to slip in some even more repulsive things. That said, the actual sex scenes are pretty good for the most part. Keiko gets to move between a couple of guys here and she’s definitely an attractive design and a decent enough performance. Add in that there’s very little in the way of repetitive animation or seriously bad short cuts taken and the quality of the OVA goes up a notch or two.

In Summary:
The first stage of Cambrian has a mix of rather good sex scenes but also some violence that will definitely turn off some people. The quality of the shows animation is pretty good and the concept, though not exactly unheard of, is executed well here. This episode is just the tip of the iceberg as it’s getting the ideas out there and mixing it with the sex so there isn’t a whole lot of plot to deal with. It’s certainly more enticing in some ways than a lot of other shows but that extra bit of violence that seems to permeate the edges of it makes me cringe a bit. That said, I’m still looking forward to the next episode to see where they may really be going with it.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language,English Subtitles

Content Grade: C+
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B-
Extras Grade: B0

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: August 22nd, 2006
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Back at the end of March 2016 we ended up celebrating our 18th year of working this particular kind of job. Way back in 1998, I had started with a little sliver of a page on a Netcom personal account that ended up becoming AnimeOnDVD.com. Life has taken us in some interesting places along the way and I’ve been utterly blessed with knowing so many people over the years – and as I find at conventions and elsewhere, I’ve been a big part of a lot of other people’s lives by the continual presence and even personality as some have told me.

As you can imagine, things change a lot over the years from when we were able to generate revenue from DVD Express back in the day along with Right Stuf as affiliate partnerships were the way most sites survived and funded their operations. The changing nature of the advertising landscape has been difficult for a lot of places in the years since as affiliate deals are largely gone and advertising is even harder. I have always worked the goal of being 99% anime/manga focused in terms of our advertising, never doing pop-ups, pop-unders, banners with sounds, and all that other problematic junk that I hate myself. I wanted advertising that was relevant to the readership.

Sadly, it’s just not a sustainable side anymore.

I ended up quite humbled last year when I needed a bit of help with a medical bill from some surgeries I had and part of that was because the advertising side just doesn’t cut it anymore. In doing my tax prep this past month, and I’ll be quite honest here, we made about $15k last year. And this site is my primary job. Suffice to say, with two teenage girls, it’s just not going to work this way much longer. So I want to try something that I’ve seen some other sites I frequent have done over the years, such as Penny Arcade back in the day, by making us fully powered by you, the fans.

As you can see, we’ve set up the GoFundMe page with a where we’re doing monthly runs with a goal of $1000 and have gotten September 2017 underway with a whole lot of new rewards added in recently! Don’t forget, we are a small business! While I had been up front with the overall yearly goal, I suspect this format will work better and we’ll be stocking with a lot more rewards as well. Doing this will help us to basically get essentially a hair above the poverty line according to the government. And I’m more than fine with that because I love what I do and I want to do what I love. That’s why I’m crazily up at 5:30 in the morning and plugging away at stuff throughout the entire day. It’s why I write reviews in the late afternoon, monitor news throughout the day, watch and write about primetime shows, dig into comic books and manga, follow conventions, review new releases of movies, DVDs, and Blu-rays. It’s why I post throughout the day on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest – so I can keep information available and fresh for my followers. It’s why I spend time each week distributing materials to our wonderful reviewers who can offer different viewpoints so we have variations in material. I live and breathe this stuff. And I love sharing it with you all.

At our current settings, we’re producing between 30-40 articles a day during the week and about a dozen each day over the weekend. That’s what we do and that’s what you’d be funding. The news, the opinions, the reviews. The social media interactions.

Those that donate will be able to choose DVD/BD rewards that I’ve got as I continue to purge my own library with $15, $25, $50, $100 levels. You can see the spreadsheet below that you’ll be able to choose from after donating!

Having done this for 18 years, it’s definitely a hugely difficult decision to do this because I’ve found a lot of ways to make it work over the years. But it’s becoming impossible to do so and this site, this audience, is not something that I want to lose, so I want to try this route and see what we can do.

I thank you from the bottom of my heart for all the support, interest, and friendship over the years from so many of you.

Help spread the word!

The violence and sex continue in Cambrian as the dark side of humanity is explored.

What They Say:
A few days have passed since the incident at the lab. It all seems like a dream until one day Keiko feels an awkward sensation all over her body. At the same time, her boyfriend starts acting differently around her, starting arguments that lead to violence. Why is her boyfriend suddenly acting differently? What does Haruhiko, Keiko’s former professor, truly want to achieve? What is the Cambrian big bang? Let the evolution begin!

The Review:
Audio:
For our primary viewing session, we listened to this show in its original language of Japanese which is encoded at 192kbps and is the only language track available for the release. The stereo mix for it is essentially what you expect from an adult release in that it’s clean and problem free during regular playback. The stereo mix itself doesn’t have much in the way of noticeable directionality which is pretty normal and overall it sounds like a standard full forward soundstage presentation.

Video:
Originally released to video in 2006, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for Cambrian look to be in great shape as the end result here is a very good looking show with hardly any real problems to it. The design of the show isn’t very vibrant in terms of colors, instead choosing to focus more on dark shades and a lot of black. Flesh tones, especially during the sex scenes, are when you notice the brightest colors and they look really good. Black levels are very well maintained and the transfer has a very smooth feel overall. Add in a lack of cross coloration and aliasing for the most part and it’s a very good looking piece.

Packaging:
Similar to the first volume in that it lets you know squarely that it’s all about the tentacle material, this volume puts Keiko in the limelight once more as the slippery tendrils wrap around her. It’s very dark looking and definitely has a creepy feel though they do give Keiko that bit of a look where you can’t be sure that she’s not enjoying it. The back cover provides a couple of shots from the show that are clean and without any real nudity while providing a summary of the premise in between them. The bottom is filled out with the basic legal jargon and the technical grid. Surprisingly, there isn’t any reversible cover this time around.

Menu:
Using the cover artwork along the right half of the menu, the layout is simple but attractive as the foreboding music plays to it. The navigation strip along the left side under the logo uses the same color motif and is quick and easy to use though it’s an easy release to leave on the main menu. The instrumental music used for the menu is unfortunately completely overbearing and several notches too high as well. Access times are nice and fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets and played accordingly.

Extras:
Unlike the first volume, not only is there no longer a photo gallery but they also removed the PSP/iPod option. This one is bone dry for extras.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
After the first installment of the series, Cambrian looked to be a show that would take a standard plotline and try to work something a bit interesting with it. Tentacle shows tend to have large epic style stories associated with them, even if the sex is all very much on the personal level. Cambrian wanted to run with forcing a kind of evolutionary change on the world, one that’s filled with the core desires of sex and violence.

In the time since the first episodes, the main character of Keiko has felt like everything that happened was a dream. She’s still feeling out of sorts however and her body doesn’t seem like it’s right. Add in a few bad dreams that make her hyper-paranoid and she’s completely on edge. It doesn’t help that her boyfriend has seemingly undergone a transformation as well as he’s now quick to anger and rather violent. He’s also continuing to grab some fun on the side though some of it is unintentional at first, such as the sequence in the car during the opening of the episode.

Haruhiko continues to use his new found abilities to his own goals, which often seem to include his own version of pleasure. The lab itself seems to be rife with potential as some seem like they’ll go along with him easily enough and others can just become pure fodder for his goals. One of the more useful ones for the twisted games that get played is the young scientist who has a serious crush on Keiko. When she’s brought in and strung up to be tortured, he’s forced to watch as they slice into her. To both his and her surprise though, this begins to formulate the change in her body as she starts to become something more.

While the first episode wasn’t exactly plot heavy, it had an interesting angle for a change. The second episode is continuing with it, but with the length of time between episodes and a lack of clarity in storytelling, it’s hard to reconnect to the show. What made it a bit less fun to watch this time around as well was the changes that they put Keiko through. With the effect in her body, stimulation causes her to change quite drastically. She ends up becoming quite unattractive with her newfound pointy nipples. The violence that’s used on her with the saw blades was also a huge turnoff. The torturous nature of the first episode was interesting at times because of how they tied it to the raw nature of the Cambrian, but in this one it’s just the darker side of certain humans coming out into the open.

In Summary:
While some shows can manage well with the one episode at a time format, something like Cambrian that wants to use a plot suffers a bit. With it being over six months between releases, it’s easy to forget exactly what was going on. Once it gets going though, much of it comes back but it doesn’t feel quite like the same show in some ways. More overtly violent, less appealing sexually, Cambrian has lost a lot of its energy going into this episode. The premise is still interesting but the execution has fallen short.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: D
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: March 20th, 2007
MSRP: $24.98
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Next on your local news… Nuns who poop!

What They Say:
Sister Rosaria is working at the village’s local church. Everything has been peaceful and many days of happiness have passed. That is, until one day when a new priest and sister arrive… and her happiness is suddenly shattered. The two are imposters; villains on the run for theft and murder. But that isn’t the only problem: the man is a former priest who sexually assaulted Sister Rosaria many times.

Now, the village’s peace is in her hands; if she doesn’t obey “Father Edward’s” demands as in the past, he has sworn to kill every single one of the villagers…

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentatin for this release brings us the original Japanese language track only but it’s done up in uncompressed stereo which is something that still stands out well even years later. The track is a pretty good as it’s a solid 1.5 mbps which means that it’s louder and a bit richer depending on your setup. Dialogue is mostly center channel based but it comes across clean and clear and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2006, the transfer for this OVA release is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. As with some of the better produced series out there, the source material here looks good with lots of bright vivid colors and some decent animation that doesn’t show too many shortcuts. The colors generally look good and solid though there are some areas where you can see the color gradient but it is a fairly small issue all told and most likely not noticeable on most setups. This is essentially a problem free transfer for the most part with very good looking animation.

Packaging:
Released in a clear keepcase, the cover artwork for Dark Chapel is certainly up front and appealing. Sister Rosaria is on her knees and looking underneath her so we get to see not only her nuns outfit but also the chains that keep her in place and the ball gag. The backdrop of the interior of the church certainly makes it clear what’s going on and it’s pure truth in advertising here. They do make note of the shows origins in the game world, but I wonder how much impact that really has considering hardly anything really gets released here. The back cover is a rather dark piece with a couple of shots from the show that are free of nudity and don’t do a good job of showing off the character designs. What we’re left with is a few set pieces and a summary that runs through the basics of what the episode is about. Production credits round out the remainder of the cover along with the solid technical grid. No insert is included nor is there a reversible cover.

Menu:
The menu design for the show is fairly decent as it uses a piece of character artwork featuring Edward and Liz in their stolen outfits against a background in which various sexual acts from the show are shown through a yellow filter. The navigation along the right is straightforward and everything works smoothly and problem free. JapanAnime’s menus continue to be some of the best in terms of flowing between each of the submenus as they fade in and out really well. Access times are nice and fast considering the fading aspect and due to the limited audio and subtitle options, the defaults are all there really is here.

Extras:
JapanAnime has included an iPod and PSP version of the show for those who want to grab it off of their personal computer. They also provide in the extras section a way to skip all the fluff in the show and go straight to all the sex.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Dark Chapel took some time to finally release from when JapanAnime first solicited it as it was announced in the summer of 2006 for December of 2006. It didn’t actually arrive until the end of Winter 2007 though and even then it wasn’t exactly something that showed up with any sort of fanfare. It tended to slip through the minds of many simply because of the delay and the second volume went to a less than helpful “To Be Announced” date so we might not even see the end of the show. Having finally found a place that had it in stock, we snapped it up and sat down to some heavenly goodness. Then the poop came flying out.

With just one episode, there’s not a lot to really go on about here but the premise starts up well enough. We’re introduced to a couple of cutthroat jewel thieves named Edward and Liz who have just pulled off quite the heist. With a small briefcase of jewels in hand, they need to lay low for awhile to let things die down a bit. As luck, or planning, would have it, they’re near a small village where the only Sister who works in the church is someone that Edward knew years ago. Rosaria doesn’t seem to recognize him completely at first, but that’s because along the way Edward and Liz killed a priest and sister that were coming to Observe Rosaria for a bit and took their clothes.

Once inside and things become clearer, it’s all downhill for Sister Rosaria from there. Edward has some longstanding issues with her from the past and he intends to make good on them by having her sign a contract that indicates that her ass is his. While Edward takes care of Rosaria, Liz gets a bit jealous and intends to have some fun of her own even as they try to lay low. How many farmhands can handle a ready and willing hot young nun? Quite a few as it turns out and they get to kneel down before her for quite awhile. Where the show turns nasty is in the relationship between Edward and Rosaria. It’s certainly a dominant/submissive one and one that involves lots of anal play, but they decided that they need to have the poo flying all over the place as well. That’s a dealbreaker for some and it certainly was for me here. It’s saving grace was that the poo didn’t fly too far. It wasn’t rocket powered, just jet powered and went a few feet. It did go wide though…

The visual look of the show, poo aside, is pretty good as it features adult looking characters and generally properly proportioned designs. The two main women look good and very different from each other while Edward doesn’t have a truly creepy look to it. He’s got a bit of menace which is to be expected, but you can see why women would be interested in him and not run in abject horror like some other male leads. The animation quality is solid throughout with a good sense of fluid motion in some of the more active moments and overall it’s a very good production. It doesn’t scream high end quality, but it’s not a piece of shovelware either that you have a hard time watching. Genuine effort was put into it and the results are on the screen.

In Summary:
Dark Chapel is a show that doesn’t speak to some of my interests which certainly hurts it in terms of its content grading, but it is overall a very solid production. With uncompressed audio, good looking animation and plenty of rough and tumble sex among adults, it’s almost a strange show in comparison to what usually comes out. It plays up a couple of fetishes nicely and the nunsploitation crowd will surely be very happy with this release. With the second volume missing in action though, it’s pretty incomplete but it doesn’t actually hurt anything with what’s going on here. If you need some nun love or more poop in your anime viewing experiences, this one will take care of you nicely.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: Japan Anime
Release Date: March 20th, 2007
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33″1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Under the guise of different clubs, a group of students lures in both boys and girls to become controlled sex slaves.

What They Say:
To the public eye, it looks like any other ordinary school; however, one club is secretly recruiting girls to make them their personal sex slaves and brainwashing the newly recruited males into enjoying one another. Which club is responsible for these demented activities, and how is it affecting the other clubs? One thing is for sure: the only thing that’s left is a dark and hopeless future.

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language only as no dub was produced for it. The stereo mix, a linear PCM track at 1.5 mbps, is essentially what you’d expect from the show as it handles dialogue well and the few music pieces and ambient sound effects are well placed. There isn’t all that much in a real sense of directionality but it works for the content at hand. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout and we did not have any problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2005, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The materials for this release are in very good shape and overall it’s a good clean and very pleasing piece of work. It manages to avoid some of the softness that seems to be (intentionally) plaguing other shows that have been out recently while not going overboard with being too vibrant. Colors look good and maintain a solid feel while cross coloration and aliasing is, for the most part, a non-issue. The show hits some very low bit rates on average, down to 1.1 in a lot of scenes, but because of how it’s animated it looks good and solid throughout.

Packaging:
The front cover works a standard style design by having two of the girls from the show clinging to each other in something of an embrace as their uniforms seemingly melt away. Each is covered with plenty of juices and has the right look to them to really highlight what the show is like. The artwork is very well done with lots of detail to it. The back cover is a bit amusing in that below the summary they list “please be aware that there’s a small gay content in this film that might be disturbing to some viewers.” Don’t fear the lesbian intonations shown on the front cover, be afraid of the small gay content within! The layout of the cover is decent but text heavy with the summary and the shows origins. A few shots from the show are included and the remainder is filled out with the production credits and solid technical grid. No insert is included nor is the cover reversible.

Menu:
JapanAnime continues to have some of the smoothest menu transitions out there though the menus are fairly basic otherwise. Using the artwork from the front cover zoomed in, the good looking illustration works well here as you get to see plenty of the detail to it. The navigation strip along the bottom is simple but looks good. The menu selections are quick and easy to use and the transitional animation for them gives the entire menu process a bit of a smooth feeling. Access times are nice and fast and due to there being only one language, our player presets were a non-issue.

Extras:
The only extra here is the PSP/iPod video version of the episode. A menu section in the extras describes the method by which to get it in clear detail as well.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Every school and every grade have its own cliques and groups that form together and seem to hold sway over things. What you don’t see too often though is the groups and cliques that form behind the scenes with their own secret designs. Dark Future takes this idea and runs with it by having a group of students that essentially have a sex slave club. Only prospective members don’t know they’re about to be in it.

The show revolves a bit around the characters of Masa and Shion, two students who live together and are very involved with each other but are hiding it from everyone else. They don’t want people to know that they live together so they go to school at different times and don’t get too all involved during the day with each other. Shion’s your average cutie but Masa works in the newspaper club and he’s been following some stories about ghost sightings within the school. His investigations lead him to some of the areas in the building that aren’t used often or during normal class hours. That tends to let him see things that really shouldn’t be going on there.

At the same time that he’s investigating this, another school club of sorts using the cover of a Relaxation Club appearance is luring young female students to their room where they’re able to talk them into a relaxed manner and slip some mind controlling drugs into their tea. The women are then taken advantage of, deflowering if required, and having the other guys in the club have their way with them until they’re fully compliant with their wishes. But it’s not just guys running the club as we also see a woman named Sumire who has taken several male students under her wing to control them and make them her own.

Masa stumbles into this and tries to figure out what’s going on, which he needs to do since Shion is being approached as a prospective member. Add in a couple of women in the newspaper club and there are a lot of cute girls that can fall into the trap. Their designs, though young obviously, are quite good looking with some decent detail. The animation is simple but it manages to look good through the usual tricks and shortcuts, such as a slightly soft image and lots of very basic colors across wide spaces. For a show that’s playing within this rather overused genre, it looks decent enough and they do a good job of making the plot work a bit more by having it be a group of students orchestrating the sex slave trade rather than just one maniacal student.

The sex itself is something of a mixed bag though, bringing in some things that just don’t appeal too much to me. It’s definitely a hardcore show though, such as having Sumire’s scene where she’s on her period being serviced by her guys. One of the women that get taken into the club is deflowered and it’s just such a rough scene for so long that it turned to be fairly unappealing. The opening sequence with Shion and Masa started the show out right and was fun but it started to devolve after that. There is still some potential in future episodes with other characters though. And yes, there is some mild male/male material in here but that wasn’t something that bothered me. I’m far more likely to cringe to watching a girl lick blood and semen up at the same time than two guys going at it.

In Summary:
Dark Future takes a rather tried and true setup and works it nicely with some very mild enhancements. It’s not a stellar show but it has some decent looking animation, very good looking character designs and an approach that lets it work a bit better overall. Some of the sexual encounters, however, were not my cup of tea and left me wanting to look away from all of it. JapanAnime has done another good job overall, though as I’m able to see bit rates on discs once more I’m a bit concerned about how low they encode the video for their shows, especially considering there’s only one episode here.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade:
Audio Grade:
Video Grade:
Packaging Grade:
Menu Grade:
Extras Grade:

Released By:
Release Date:
MSRP:
Running Time:
Video Encoding:
Aspect Ratio:

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Using a real school as a front, a new secret School of Housewives is created in order to have some really twisted fun with.

What They Say:
Three housewives are required to attend a parent conferencing because their children were causing trouble in school. At the school, they are welcomed by two male employees who tell them that the school is closed. The men lead them to an old abandoned school and punish them in place of their children! Will giving the parents an obedience lesson really affect their children’s behavior? Will the parents learn from it? Or will they…

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language track only in PCM form in stereo, which is par for the course with Japan Anime releases. What we get here is a simple and straightforward stereo mix that’s mostly center channel based anyway for the dialogue and sex effects while the minimal music and a couple of action effects make up the usage on the stereo channels. Dialogue is however nice and clean and clear throughout and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2005, the transfer for this show is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The materials on hand are in very good shape with lots of clean looking animation, bright colors and solid looking designs. For the most part, the transfer here is well authored with colors looking right and no visible aliasing or cross coloration. Some of the colors don’t maintain a solid feel though and some areas are much more noticeable than others. There are a few camera tricks, like sections during a pan that look blurred because of the method use, that don’t look that great but it’s more a source thing than anything else.

Packaging:
The layout and design for this cover is done in a very simple manner but it showcases all the women so it does accomplish one of its goals. With a strip of character art along the top just below the series name, you get to see who’ll be in the show and then one of them in a full shot below that. This is the same thing on the reverse side cover though on that the full image you can see her panties as the shirt doesn’t cover her entirely. The back cover provides a collage of images from the show and another full length shot of one of the women wrapped around the short basic story summary. The discs features are all clearly listed along the bottom. The overall design is definitely unusual compared to most other releases but even with as much open space as there is on the front it gets most things just right.

Menu:
The menu layout is similar to the front cover without the same character artwork. It does the split style with the burgundy background and black strip but it uses the reverse side character artwork for the main draw and lines the selections on the opposite side of that. It’s a decent looking menu but like the cover it works but feels really minimal in a way. Access times are nice and fast and while the audio language wasn’t an issue the subtitles did get picked up properly via the player presets.

Extras:
The only extra on the disc is a slide show gallery of images from the show. The packaging does indicate that there is a PSP movie inside but I’ve got zero clue or experience in how to extract that or how it’d look on the PSP as I can’t bring myself to actually watch anything on that small of a screen.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Desperate Carnal Housewives is another series that JapanAnime put out and it’s one that at the time was pretty welcome as it came not long after the Japanese release rather than a lengthy window between. The show is amusing in that it’s the kind of series where you can watch it and think, even though it’s not something that you can imagine really happening, you can imagine that if it did it would definitely be possible in Japan.

The crux of the story is that three young mothers have arrived at their children’s elite school because they’ve been notified about problems with their children. One of them is prim and proper in a kimono, another is a flashy type who shows off a lot of skin and the third is in between. They’re all hot in their own way and each play up their archetypes well. Thrown into the mix when they arrive at the school is that there’s a young teacher there who was asked to come by the principal but the school is locked shut so she can’t get in. Everything changes though when a small bus arrives and two male employee’s of the school who are playing relations to the principal tell them that they had to make a location change at the last minute and that they’re there to take them to the other school. The young teacher comes along and all three women leave their vehicles there and go in the bus.

Naturally, you know how it goes from here. The two men take the four women to the “secret school” which is actually a full on school designed for little kids. It’s even got the tiny bathroom stalls with the cute animals painted on the stall doors and all that. Once they all arrive there, the men inform them that there are problems with their kids and that it’s typically the parent’s fault when this kind of stuff happens so they want the parents to go through the routine of the kids which will then have the parents react, hopefully in the same way the kids do so that the parent understands what’s happening. So in order to be really ready for this, the women are all given adult sized yet too small versions of the kids uniforms which is just priceless. While they’re off changing though, one of the guys takes down the teacher who came along and dominates her completely by deflowering her and ensuring that she’s basically under their thrall.

From there, each of the mothers are put through the paces as they’re given things to do that the kids do and they of course fail along the way. One of them does a skip rope session and she falls and says she can’t do it anymore, which leads to the jump rope being changed to a whip and she gets taken care of nicely. Another mother has her clothes removed partially and gets all in denial, again like her child, which leads to her running off to the bathroom where we learn more nasty things about her. The most amusing though had to be the one mother who found herself being placed halfway through one of those kids houses with her legs spread wide. Behind her, he puts a rocking horse that then rocks forward to tease her just enough before it rocks away and then back. Who thinks of that? It goes a bit conventional after that with her being laid out on the roof of the house but I know I can’t go back to my own kid’s classroom now without some of this in my head.

The character designs for the show are fairly attractive though there isn’t anything that’s outright top to bottom sexy but that works in the shows favor since it’s going for a real world approach. I was amused at first by the young teacher since I thought she was like a high school student. Instead she’s just the right type of aged character to deal with young kids so it fit well but also made her stand out from the rest of them rather well. The men themselves are pretty standard fare and you can almost get that Shusaku feeling from them in how they operate. That’s the closest I can associate this series with so far and I expect it to play out similar to that but with parents instead of kids.

In Summary:
While it’s doing an amusing send up of a popular TV show with its name, Desperate Carnal Housewives is a surprisingly fun little piece that’s just a bit softer than most other shows out there visually which gives it a good feeling. The location and designs are well done while the premise is humorous but works well considering how many times we’ve seen it done in the past but with the kids going through the wringer. The slight change of pace with the parents getting dealt with gives it a few more areas to play with and it looks like this show will do that. While not a stand out piece it’s a good bit of fun and had us laughing and cringing several times.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, Slideshow

Content Grade: B-
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: C+

Released By: JapanAnime
Release Date: January 17th, 2006
MSRP: $24.98
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

When these pilots aren’t on duty, what else can they do but fool around?

What They Say:
An enormous monster appears and attacks the The City, only to be thwarted by a group of amazingly voluptuous Super Heroines! Explosive action, dynamite sex scenes & Battle Royales take place in this futuristic flight of fantastic proportions that will make you cream in your pants!

The Review:
Audio:
This release features a good bilingual set of tracks which, while basic, does fit the material pretty well. Both the English and Japanese mixes are your standard stereo pieces which are encoded at a rate of 192 kbps. While there is a bit of action to the show in several scenes, it doesn’t come across much worse than most TV series we’ve seen. Dialogue and the sex sounds still make up the bulk of the audio tracks here and they come across well even if they are basic forward soundstage pieces with no depth. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2006, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The look of this show is reminiscent of some of the first digital anime productions in that it has a very bright and almost plastic-like feel to it when it comes to the character designs. Though not as flat as some of them, there isn’t much real depth within the designs due to the colors being strong and vibrant. The bitrate for it is all over the map but the end results are fairly pleasing with solid looking colors throughout the bulk of it and a show that is free from major aliasing. Some cross coloration does show up throughout, mostly during panning sequences, and while it is annoying at times it doesn’t detract heavily. Dyogrammaton doesn’t have a standout look to it, it’s a solid presentation that should please most.

Packaging:
The cover art for this is certainly bright and colorful as it features the lead in a skintight costume which accentuates her assets while a giant robot of some sort is floating against the sky behind her. The awful series name combined with the poor font really makes it hard to figure out what it is and is the main detracting point here. The back cover is fairly traditional as it has a 50/50 split in colors through which one side has a series of stills and the other the very basic summary. The bottom portion has more shots from the show and is rounded out by the standard ASM layout for production and technical information. The reverse side is identical except that it features some non-explicit shots from the show. No insert is included.

Menu:
The main menu features a shot of Hikari from the back cover which looks good with lots of detail and a vibrant color palette. The background for it is a fairly busy piece that has an angled strip of clips from the show as well as a moving background behind that. The music fits in with all of it as well as can be expected as it is fairly upbeat and aggressive. The layout is standard fashion for ASM which includes a straight to sex feature. Access times are fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets. What’s surprising is that when you press play, there is a ninety-second video that plays which is basically a promo for the show itself. No language features are available here and any on-screen text is left untranslated.

Extras:
The only included extra is a brief set of images in a gallery.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Dyogrammaton, a two-episode series from the folks at Discovery, plays up some fairly clich�d material which is to be expected when it comes to the setting and trappings. If you see this and think Evangelion, then the creative staff accomplished their goal. Unlike a lot of adult shows that set up just the characters, we do get a fair bit of action material introduced here as well which serves as a bookend to things. Unfortunately, it tends to interfere with the actual sex material itself.

The show takes place in a near-future Tokyo environment where massive monsters show up on occasion and wreck havoc. A group has been organized to deal with it and they have pilots that rush out and handle the danger when necessary. It’s been a few month since the last incident which has left everyone a bit lax in their duties. Only one person is on hand when a new monster shows up and for some reason they’re not given the task of stopping it. Everyone else is out of the complex doing their own thing and they’d rather wait for them to come back rather than launch Unit 1. That only makes you want to see Unit 1 all the more to realize what kind of foolishness is going on here and whether it’s warranted.

The nearest pilots are Hikari and Kyosuke who just happen to be enjoying some quality time together at a hotel near the train station. They’ve been together for about a year now, since the incident wherein Hikari had rescued him in the middle of an attack. Since things have been quiet, the two are now taking some quality time together outside of the base and getting it on. Their sex scene, which is interspersed with action footage of the monster fighting against the military, is fairly lengthy and they try quite a few different positions while also taking a break between sessions. It’s all good until the military catches up to them though and hauls them back in for action.

There’s a second sex scene in the episode which is far too short as it focuses on figuring out who the traitor is that’s leaking information to the enemy. This comes in during the last few minutes of the episode and likely could hold an entire episode on its own. With the lengthy first scene and then this one, combined with the various giant monster action moments, the show feels very poorly paced and disjointed. Some shows can work well when they have some good trappings to deal with, by Dyogrammaton really has a hard time struggling with what it wants to do. At the same time, you have to give them some credit for doing something that has a good look to it, as the CG models look great and there are some creative character designs for the monsters and the main cast, even if they are somewhat derivative of traditional action characters.

The sex, in general, is decent, mostly because you have to enjoy the scene between Hikari and Kyosuke as they’re eager and completely consensual. There’s a lot of pent up sexual tension that’s released as they move from the bathtub to the bed and then play for quite awhile on the bed. There is a rather amusing moment or two in there as well. During one of a couple of sequences where Hikari uses her mouth on Kyosuke, she asks him to climax on her face to which is more than eager to comply with. When he does so, she complains that he got it in her eye. Now, this is awkward enough in and of itself, but when you look at anime characters and see their massive eyes, you just have to wonder how can you not get it in someone’s eyes? And if you don’t want it there, close them!

In Summary:
Dyogrammaton isn’t a bad show but it certainly feels like one that had some good ideas but didn’t know how to execute them properly. The character designs are cute and fun, there are some surprisingly solid action sequences with the military and the monster, and the sex is lengthy and decent for the main couple. The pacing is where it’s suffering as well as the relatively complete lack of characterization for the two leads. There is some great missed potential when it comes to comedy though, especially when the military breaks in on the two kids in the midst of their third round of sex. Now that’s when Kyosuke needed to have a premature moment.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, French Subtitles, German Subtitles, Italian Subtitles, Photo Gallery

Content Grade: C
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B-
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: C+

Released By: Japan Anime
Release Date: September 27th, 2007
MSRP: $24.95
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

Back at the end of March 2016 we ended up celebrating our 18th year of working this particular kind of job. Way back in 1998, I had started with a little sliver of a page on a Netcom personal account that ended up becoming AnimeOnDVD.com. Life has taken us in some interesting places along the way and I’ve been utterly blessed with knowing so many people over the years – and as I find at conventions and elsewhere, I’ve been a big part of a lot of other people’s lives by the continual presence and even personality as some have told me.

As you can imagine, things change a lot over the years from when we were able to generate revenue from DVD Express back in the day along with Right Stuf as affiliate partnerships were the way most sites survived and funded their operations. The changing nature of the advertising landscape has been difficult for a lot of places in the years since as affiliate deals are largely gone and advertising is even harder. I have always worked the goal of being 99% anime/manga focused in terms of our advertising, never doing pop-ups, pop-unders, banners with sounds, and all that other problematic junk that I hate myself. I wanted advertising that was relevant to the readership.

Sadly, it’s just not a sustainable side anymore.

I ended up quite humbled last year when I needed a bit of help with a medical bill from some surgeries I had and part of that was because the advertising side just doesn’t cut it anymore. In doing my tax prep this past month, and I’ll be quite honest here, we made about $15k last year. And this site is my primary job. Suffice to say, with two teenage girls, it’s just not going to work this way much longer. So I want to try something that I’ve seen some other sites I frequent have done over the years, such as Penny Arcade back in the day, by making us fully powered by you, the fans.

As you can see, we’ve set up the GoFundMe page with a where we’re doing monthly runs with a goal of $1000 and have gotten October 2017 underway with a whole lot of new rewards added in recently! Don’t forget, we are a small business! While I had been up front with the overall yearly goal, I suspect this format will work better and we’ll be stocking with a lot more rewards as well. Doing this will help us to basically get essentially a hair above the poverty line according to the government. And I’m more than fine with that because I love what I do and I want to do what I love. That’s why I’m crazily up at 5:30 in the morning and plugging away at stuff throughout the entire day. It’s why I write reviews in the late afternoon, monitor news throughout the day, watch and write about primetime shows, dig into comic books and manga, follow conventions, review new releases of movies, DVDs, and Blu-rays. It’s why I post throughout the day on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest – so I can keep information available and fresh for my followers. It’s why I spend time each week distributing materials to our wonderful reviewers who can offer different viewpoints so we have variations in material. I live and breathe this stuff. And I love sharing it with you all.

At our current settings, we’re producing between 30-40 articles a day during the week and about a dozen each day over the weekend. That’s what we do and that’s what you’d be funding. The news, the opinions, the reviews. The social media interactions.

Those that donate will be able to choose DVD/BD rewards that I’ve got as I continue to purge my own library with $15, $25, $50, $100 levels. You can see the spreadsheet below that you’ll be able to choose from after donating!

Having done this for 18 years, it’s definitely a hugely difficult decision to do this because I’ve found a lot of ways to make it work over the years. But it’s becoming impossible to do so and this site, this audience, is not something that I want to lose, so I want to try this route and see what we can do.

I thank you from the bottom of my heart for all the support, interest, and friendship over the years from so many of you.

Help spread the word!

The best way to deal with a psychological attack is to… re-enact it in real life to overcome it? Well, if it involves lots of sex…

What They Say:
A giant monster bent on destruction emerges in the city of Odaiba. The purpose of this invasion is to destroy Dakt headquarters – as well as the entire city. As the countdown to destruction begins, the sexy Hikari takes to the battlefield to engage in war and then bondage. Will our heroes save the city, or is war just another excuse to get it on with hot girls who have an appetite for sex-struction?!

The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this release features a good bilingual set of tracks which, while basic, does fit the material pretty well. Both the English and Japanese mixes are your standard stereo pieces which are encoded at a rate of 192 kbps. While there is a bit of action to the show in several scenes, it doesn’t come across much worse than most TV series we’ve seen. Dialogue and the sex sounds still make up the bulk of the audio tracks here and they come across well even if they are basic forward soundstage pieces with no depth. Dialogue is clean and clear throughout and we had no problems with dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

Video:
Originally released in 2006, the transfer for this OVA is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The look of this show is reminiscent of some of the first digital anime productions in that it has a very bright and almost plastic-like feel to it when it comes to the character designs. Though not as flat as some of them, there isn’t much real depth within the designs due to the colors being strong and vibrant. The bitrate for it is all over the map but the end results are fairly pleasing with solid looking colors throughout the bulk of it and a show that is free from major aliasing. Some cross coloration does show up throughout, mostly during panning sequences, and while it is annoying at times it doesn’t detract heavily. Dyogrammaton doesn’t have a standout look to it, it’s a solid presentation that should please most.

Packaging:
Though not quite as bright as the first volume, this installment still has a lot of vibrant colors with the pinks and reds combined with the flesh tones. The character artwork is certainly appealing and blatant though they avoid anything really explicit here beyond some massive nipples. The logo once again is a real pain to read because of the font but the name itself really doesn’t help either. The back cover is fairly traditional as it has a 50/50 split in colors through which one side has a series of stills and the other the very basic summary. The bottom portion has more shots from the show and is rounded out by the standard ASM layout for production and technical information. The reverse side is identical except that it features some non-explicit shots from the show. No insert is included.

Menu:
The main menu features a shot of Hikari from the back cover of the first volume which looks good with lots of detail and a vibrant color palette. The background for it is a fairly busy piece that has an angled strip of clips from the show as well as a moving background behind that. The music fits in with all of it as well as can be expected as it is fairly upbeat and aggressive. The layout is standard fashion for ASM which includes a straight to sex feature. Access times are fast and the disc correctly read our players’ language presets. What’s surprising is that when you press play, there is a ninety-second video that plays which is basically a promo for the show itself. No language features are available here and any on-screen text is left untranslated.

Extras:
The only included extra is a brief set of images in a gallery and the traditional bonus video that’s better off ignored.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Dyogrammaton barrels its way through a second installment and throws lots of stuff at the screen without much of it sticking, unless it’s meant to be sticky. The first volume offered up some very Evangelion-like material in terms of designs and such and it had some decent lengthy sex scenes but it was rushed and felt a bit weak. With the second volume, it becomes all the more apparent that they really don’t know what kind of story tell or how to do it as it feels even more like amateur half-hour than before.

The dealings with the Arch Dissolver becomes more complicated here as when the small group of pilots attack it they’re subjected to a series of psychological attacks. Kyosuke sees a strange version of himself talking to him but the women in the group, which focuses on the captain, find themselves tied up and being taken by the same white-haired Kyosuke. It’s edited in a bad way so that there isn’t any real good continuity to it and it changes out regularly for the short duration that it runs. Everyone is a bit unhinged by this kind of attack and unsure of how to deal with it once the Arch Dissolver makes it disappearing act once again. It won’t show up again for a few hours so everyone gets a bit of downtime, which includes having Kyosuke check-in Hikari while she’s recovering from her wounds in the hospital wing.

Even knowing that Kyosuke has a relationship with Hikari, the captain is still frustrated by the psychological attack she suffered from the Arch Dissolver. So her plan to deal with it one that isn’t a surprise in an adult show in that she’s intent on having sex with Kyosuke. The idea being that if she does it for real, it won’t impact her when the Arch Dissolver puts it into her head. Kyosuke doesn’t fend her off much, which isn’t a surprise, and they get down to business in a traditional manner. In an amusing bit of pacing, she performs some decent oral sex on him and then reveals that she’s really a virgin. Nothing like having some mad oral skills and then revealing that. It doesn’t turn Kyosuke away in the slightest and the scene goes on in a fairly traditional way.

In an even more amusing turn, when Kyosuke returns to the hospital after the next battle to check in on Hikari, she’s actually awake this time and aware of things. Bandaged around the head and in a basic smock, he really does tell her that he checked with the doctors and they gave him permission to have sex with her in the bed. She’s surprised by it but doesn’t turn him away. I couldn’t help but laugh at that, especially since the scene comes at the tail end of the episode and doesn’t exactly get far. In fact, I think the end credits sequence ran longer than this particular scene, which is sad considering the episode overall is just barely over twenty-two minutes. It used to be that adult shows would run closer to thirty minutes each but they seem to be getting shorter and shorter as time goes on.

In Summary:
While I had liked certain parts of Dyogrammaton in the first volume, I really came away from this episode underwhelmed. The character designs are coming off a bit more grotesque this time around with the body shapes and the animation design for it. The action scenes with the Arch Dissolver look weaker now and that entire part of the story just doesn’t click well. Lack of good characters and an even weaker story that’s cribbing from certain mecha shows has me laughing at this more than anything else. Add in some bad scripting and poor situations and you can’t help but to roll your eyes. The first episode had some good material for Kyosuke and Hikari to work through but what’s done here just doesn’t work at all.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, French Subtitles, German Subtitles, Photo Gallery

Content Grade: D
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B-
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: C

Released By: Adult Source Media
Release Date: January 13th, 2008
MSRP: $24.99
Running Time: 30 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.