Rhea Gall Force is a 1989 action sci-fi war anime OVA that functions as a continuation of the Gall Force franchise following the events of the original trilogy. The same writer and director team up of Katsuhito Akiyama and Hideki Kakinuma was incharge of it, same animation director and character designer as well, with the voices of Michie Tomizawa, Eriko Hara, Naoko Watanabe, Hiromi Tsuru, Chieko Honda and Naoko Matsui.
Set years after the events of the original trilogy, in the year 2085, WWIII devastated a great portion of the planet and Paranoid technology found by a scientist brought an end to civilization as human guerrilla groups are fighting against the mechanical menaces previously used by humans but that turned on them. Sandy, a young and idealist soldier, meets with other humans in the resistance, such as Score, in order to leave Earth and survive as a species.
The post-apocaliptic arc begins. Everything we knew about Gall Force before isnt really that prominent here. There's no outer space battles, no all-female armies nor do we get a comedic relief or surreal imagery. The story turns into a very familiar plot about humans battling machines after civilization falls and there's only rubble and military resistance groups. I gotta say that this isnt a bad example of this type of fiction but the things that made Gall Force distinctive and original are almost gone.
Having said that, Rhea Gall Force it’s still a very solid OVA since the original team behind the last few entries worked on this one as well and you can tell that they had fun changing things up a bit by having different but well done characters designs, other beautifully illustrated locations and even some excellently storyboarded and directed action sequences in the ground as opposed to the starship fights from before, which is a nice change of pace, as good as those other battles were. A lot more bullet and machine gun action in this one, but it’s far from just being flashy spectacle, especially because the armed conflict still has some severe casualties and some intense moments of loss and death.
The main group is severely cut down and does not have as many interesting characters but the leading pair of heroines carry the OVA. Sandy is pretty much Rabby and Score is practically Lufy but she's good with guns instead of piloting. Their clashes are cute and even if very little time is spent fleshing them out, by the time Score congratulates Sandy after her mission is completed you do get to realize that they do get along after all, specially after sharing moments in combat. Aside from that, most of the characters are almost inconsequential, one-dimensional or empty, barely any of them have a set personality and others can feel stale and generic. This is most likely because of the short runtime and because the group mentality of the others is a major theme that still has resonance here.
The animation is pretty good, the movements of the robotic enemies are as neatly done as you expect from this team and the fluidity of the shootout sequences is appreciated, making things very appealing and smooth. The visuals and the animation are the strong points of this movie as a lot of effort was put into that department. Some corners are cut but it’s overall a very well made OVA.
I can totally recommend it to anyone looking for an action anime with a science fiction flavor to it. You don't even need to watch the other movies to understand the plot of this one since the scenario is so familiar and not much of the previous films is brought back or referenced directly, which is a good choice, making it stand alone for the most part. Fun characters and marvelous action.
No comments:
Post a Comment