Very good review Angel. It has been years since I watched that Anime. Your review brought it all back to me like it was yesterday that I watched it. I believe your Ratings are pretty spot on but I probably would have given a 8 for the Art; as I find it was a bit stylized and unique to Outlaw as a whole. I just might have to break out Outlaw Star and watch it again in the near distant future. *Sets a course for the Galactic Layline...*
Outlaw Star tv Review
Story & Characters
Outlaw star is a Space Western by trade, it's about an outlaw, not to be confused with a Pirate, by the name of Gene Starwind. Quite the perverted outlaw that seems to not have any trouble getting the girls, until he has the unfaithful encountering with three females aboard his ship, called, you guessed it The Outlaw Star, which the XGP’s artificial intelligence system has a name of Gilliam II, who later gets a makeover, but when Gilliam II asks Gene to name the ship he chooses the Outlaw Star due to the brief encounter with "Hot Ice" Hilda which helped him obtain "rights" to the unnamed ship that can only be successfully flown by Melfina, which seems to have been found in some sort of suitcase and used to guide the ship towards the Galactic Layline, which happens to be something a lot of people are working to obtain access to, including several Taoist pirates that want the layline for their own selfish desires, as do some pirates often want. We learn about the trusty sidekick, an eleven year old son of a hacker by the name of James "Jim" Hawking, who also happens to be the "brains" behind their place of business called Starwind and Hawking Enterprises. He is responsible for pretty much the repairing of broken and forgotten machinery, hacking and other computer related things, who joins Gene on his adventures to obtain more knowledge of the layline and help Melfina discover the history of herself and why she was found in a suitcase.
Sadly Gene had to cross paths with a trained assassin one day by the name of "Twilight" Suzuka, who has come to collect the bounty that was set on Fred Luo, who so happens hire Gene as his personal bodyguard to protect him from the dreaded Suzuka. Poor Fred, his "love" for Gene and Jim have him constantly granting money, these grants and loans are suppose to help Gene along his journeys and towards the end he's accomplished quite a debt. But after awhile, Suzuka starts losing interest in killing Gene to join him on his adventures for the layline and to show off her wonderful techniques with a wooden sword, called a bokken. And if it couldn't get any worse he had to anger a Ctarl-Ctarl and not just a typical one, this one is a genius, also young, have a large ego and who is quick to anger. The Ctarl-Ctarl are a proud race of cat-like people who have the ability to tap into their "beast strength" however it leaves them drained and depletes a lot of calories, often giving Gene and Jim the chance they often needed to escape Aisha Clanclan. Unfortunately she locates and starts to tag along on their space adventures as well, demanding them to pay the bills that she blames them for the reason for her anger outburst. She wants the layline for her prideful race and to possibly boast her ego even higher, since most think the layline is treasure.
Unfortunately as soon as Gene hears of the MacDougall brothers, his attention is slightly switched and he is constantly chasing them, and demanding their audience, however the tables are turned later in the series as we find Gene and the crew fleeing from not just the MacDougall brothers, but also Professor Nguyen Khan, who happens to be one crafty and crazy professor and the dreaded Taoist space pirates who is led by Lord Hazanko and his band of 108 as well as some of the most dangerous Taoist wielders ever ! What will be the fate as the final battle comes to a climax and what of the weird obsession that Harry MacDougall has for the beautiful Melfina !?! watch to find out how it all comes together !
Rating:
Art
Even despite it's age, there was no detail left undone in this one. After awhile the lines drawn under their eyes didn't matter much, I have no idea, to this day, why that art style was used, it was like they were constantly blushing. I am impressed with the comedy aspects and the moments of Gene being his perverted self, how much more emphasis was added to the artwork and style. This is another pre-2k sort of anime, back in the late 90s when this one appeared. Even though it was never finished, or at least to the point that Morning Star Studio ran out of money and canceled a second season, it just sort of left it open to a whole grand adventure that never came, but that didn't stop the beauty any. Even the nudity parts were actually done tastefully and not over the top, heck what am I saying, when Gene saw the ecchi parts things got huge !
Rating:
Sound
The sounds were done properly, you could hear the smacks quite nicely when Gene stepped over the lines of getting too "friendly" with the ladies. The gunfire and battles were done nicely. However I rarely heard a sword striking another sword, a gun striking another gun, when they were heated in battle and they had ran out of Caster shells for their primitive and outdated weaponry for their taste and that time. There really wasn't that much music throughout the anime that I can remember, sure a few background songs here and there, the ending and beginning themes were most fitting, but I felt some of the things could have deserved more. At least a heated battle piece, or a song leading up to a battle, but that really didn't happen much.
Rating:
Presentation
Overall I would have to say this was quite a tough one to follow. There was just too many time jumps for me to keep track of their space adventures at times. I actually found myself pausing and rewinding in places, trying to figure out if my dvd player had skipped a scene or something. I would state this anime, not the one that debuted on cartoon network in the edited style, is seriously not for the faint of heart. If ecchi, mature scenes, cussing, detailed battle scenes and perverted characters disturb you, then it's best to avoid this one. I would consider this one to be watched by audiences mature enough to handle such things, I wouldn't set my niece down in front of this one and watch it with her without a doubt. I never realized this was actually in the anime, because when I had seen it on tv, it was in it's edited format, I can now see why they even skipped one episode, there was just no way to logically show that one. Overall I have no regrets buying this anime, I still had great enjoyments out of watching it and will watch it in future times to come. I had actually forgotten the whole entire anime and was thankful to have been graced, yet again, with a complete box set. so remember : There are bright ones, and there are those that are dim. ~"Hot Ice" Hilda
Rating:
Final Verdict
7.1667 (above average)
Reviewed by angelxxuan, Aug 01, 2011
Comments
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UberDog Aug 01, 2011
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z827 Aug 02, 2011
... A flirt of a protaginist.
Man , that guy reminds me way too much of Rance.
Still , how "Ecchi" is this "Ecchi"? Can't be to the point of H right? :oI've never really watched Outlaw Star before despite hearing about it several times ( Merely by chance ) so I guess this review is gonna aid in my judgement of whether I'd watch it or not... though I'm still torn between the quality inconsistencies in the various fields of this Anime.
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zalin Aug 02, 2011
I have the uncut DVD box set and I had no problems following this series I love this series.
Oh and perverted characters? This sums up like 99% of anime. -
Damanex Aug 02, 2011
This show really speaks to my soul, especially being a young man and the whole world, or in this case, universe, laid out before you. I have been in Gene's shoes as far as my travels go and I think that is what draws me more to his character. Fantastic review on what I consider a classic, keep up the awesome work!
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LightFykki Aug 25, 2011
Wow, that second sentence there is long.. xD But now on the serious part, very good review!^^ I seriously think so, especially about art and sound. Even though you haven't wrote much there, you hit about the topic what most are interested to expect.
The only thing maybe about the story.. You shouldn't write that much about the plot, instead write more the aspect of it ,all the progress and the impression you had from it, not the story itself.
But still very good and since I haven't heard for this one before I will definitely look forward towards it and this review will come in handy. -
angelxxuan Banned Member May 20, 2012
thanks for the replies, I have learned some since then
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