Strait Jacket

Strait Jacket is a 3 episodes OVA. Which is, no matter how you look at it, finished within a flash. But truth be said, after seeing some of the artwork and reading a synopsis about Strait Jacket, I just had to watch it. Good thing It wasn't disappointing. The scenes were quite well done; though you always see details that could have been better. Such as battle scenes being done too fast and the magic not being well explained. But what do you expect from 3 episodes; there wasn't any time to do so. However, Strait Jacket did a perfectly fine job on making 3 episodesworthwhile and actually make sense. A lot of short Anime series (OVA in particular) explain nothing and/or let nothing happen due to their short time. Some even rush things through a few episodes and gives us an open ending. Strait Jacket isn't one of them. Though you might consider it to have an open end; it is not a cliffhanger and doesn't really disappoint you. It's just what you'd expect it to be. Nothing too flasy, nothing too fancy, nothing weird, awkward or lame. It is quite enjoyable and can be watched with a coke and some popcorn. See it as watching a movie; since it in total is almost as long. I give this series a 7 overall, though the sounds get an 8 from me. It really adds up to the series, creates suspense and isn't repeated too much. Other words, it's perfectly fine, just like the OVA is. So really, if you have little time to kill and want to enjoy a good serie within a short amount of time; this is a pretty good choice.

I take it from the number of recent reviews that, much like with Negadon, most of the people will probably be familiar with this through Sci-Fi's 10/20/08 airing. Strait Jacket is definitely an OVA worth watching, and a pretty easy one to watch at that. Not too hard on plot elements, backstory, or technobabble/magibabble, it's not exactly a laid-back anime but it's something that can be enjoyed with a full bucket of popcorn, just be careful not to spill any after seeing a few "OH SNAP!" moments here and there. Before going into detail, I should add that what makes this OVA work for the English-speakingworld is its nearly spot-on dub. The dub isn't perfect, and in some areas can be less than stellar (I'm less than impressed with the dub of Mary Simmons, who comes off as a pretty weak character, despite being voiced by Bridget Hoffmann) but with a cast made of up, get this: Steve Blum, Crispin Freeman, Vic Mognogna (yes, you read that right: all three in the same OVA!) Kari Wahlgren, Jamieson Price, and Lara Jill Miller along with the aforementioned Bridget Hoffman, you just cannot go wrong. Story: 7 (Good) The story is not exactly exceptional but far from bland and unoriginal: it's the late 19th century, and people have figured out how to mechanize sorcery, basically. Since practicing too much sorcery can have nasty side effects, mainly turning people into homocidal demons, sorcerists wear "mould suits" which allows them protection. However, sometimes these suits fail, and the number of demon transformations have risen due to mold suit sabotage by a terrorist group calling themselves "Oddman." It's up to the Tactical Sorcerists, or "Strait Jackets" to deal with these demon outbursts. Hammond is one of these sorcerists; he considers his rival Steinberg to be an extreme danger due to his unlicensed status, unrestrained methods and sometimes downright suicidal attitude, which may have something to do with the relationship he has with the strange little girl Capeltata. The story alone is not what makes this OVA great, but it's not something just tacked on either. Art: 7 (Good) Anymore, the art really can't be considered all that special, but given the average state of art in anime in recent years (a pretty big jump in quality, and pretty much light-years over some of the darkest days in the medium; see M.D. Geist, Mad Dog 34 or Vampire Wars) that's almost becoming a compliment, and if you can't be spectacular, at least being average beats the other alternative, especially when "average" is becoming pretty darn decent lately. Though, speaking of M.D. Geist this OVA doesn't spare on the blood and gore either. It lacks the sheer cheese factor of that particularly ancient and bad OVA, but take it as you will in regards to whether it drags the OVA down or props it up. Sound: 8 (Very Good) It's hard to determine, really, whether all the points that contribute to this category being so high really deserve to belong here or over at the character column, because the voice acting really goes far towards making this OVA work. But even if you take all that out, we get some pretty awesome sound effects. Character: 8 (Very Good) Ahh, now we get to the best part. The characters are great, and its entirely thanks to their English VA's. Mary Simmons, despite having Bridget Hoffman behind her, does tend to fail, but given the opportunities for the rest of the cast (hey, it's got Steven Blum and Crispin Freeman as the leads) there's not much that can be said other than you simply can't go wrong. If you want to experience just how awesome Freeman and Blum can be, let alone together, you owe it to yourselves to see this. Enjoyment: 8 (Very Good) And that's just what this OVA is: awesome, and Blum's and Freeman's voices are just dripping of it. Trust me, you may not enjoy all 90 minutes but you'll enjoy darn near close to it. The only real damn shame about Strait Jacket is that unlike Read or Die there's no series to follow it, but given how recent this OVA is hopefully that will change soon. Which gives Strait Jacket a final score of: 8: Very Good

Sorcery was brought out of superstition and myth to be used in everyday life activities such as medicine, agriculture, and even the military. Society has grown quite fond of its use to the point were they have been completely dependant upon it. However, there's a penalty for constant use, which happens to be that the user would soon lose control of it, and transform into a blood thirsty monster murdering everyone in its path. Modern weapons are useless against the creatures, therefore to combat these creatures an organization named The Sorcery Management Bureau, deploys men clad in armor called Tactical Sorcerist. The armor is referredto as Mold, and it's equipped with heavy artillery supported by sorcery. Leiot Steinberg is a rogue sorcerist that takes up a job and finds himself working for the bureau; but his very presence aggravates another Mold user by the name of Isaac Hammond. -summary Strait Jacket is supposedly the first part of a three episode OVA that was being released in 2007. Honestly, I don't know how true that is since things seemed pretty cleared up to me, and I haven't heard anything about a sequel or additional OVA's; but it's not like I actually care if this story continues anyway. In any case, this is pretty much another run o' the mill action anime title that is over-saturated with cliché characters, ie; main character searching for that "thing" to live for, chibi character who hardly ever strings together more than one complete sentence to maintain the mystery, all the way down to the predictable climax and the usual government conspiracies. I don't have a problem with the complete lack of originality as long as the story and plot is interesting. Unfortunately, outside of the visuals and brief action scenes, there is little to find interesting here. We get to know quite a bit about the bland characters, and they do serve their purposes as plot devices but I really wasn't attached to any of them, and I couldn't care less where they were going either. Instead, I just couldn't wait for them to get there. I mean everyone was putting me to sleep. The plot really is very straight forward and easy to digest, but it's also predictable and badly written. It mainly follows Leiot either attempting to stop another rampage, tid bits on his past, or Isaac's development. There was a small attempt at mystery but it was completely wasted, because the writers decided to expose some of the facial hairs of the suspicious man hiding half way in the shadows, and there was only one person who looked like that. Great move. One thing is for sure, and that is Strait Jacket is indeed pretty. There's some good attention to detail in the backgrounds concerning landscapes, and the camera work was pretty good. The animation is not as good as some fans are selling it though, but the 2D effects are very crisp with some really nice character designs of the mecha-like Mold units. There was also a few cool monster designs as well. The demons do their fair share of slice and dice in nice detail, and they just so happen to provide the best action scenes. Sadly, the battles between them and the Mold were very boring to me. Yes, they did look nice with the pretty energy blasts that were made up of vibrant colors, but the lack of movement in a majority of the scenes, and overall poor choreography did nothing for me. I thought the soundtrack was good with a nice song at a few points, and I really didn't have a problem with the dub or sub; but I will point out Steven Blum's talents as a competent voice actor were wasted as Leiot. He completely lacked any type of range, which was obviously due to the stereotypical and bland character he was forced to handle. Overall, this anime didn't impress me at all. I feel Strait Jacket will more than likely appeal to the very easy to please who love everything anime. After binging on so many action anime with far better fight scenes than this, I just can't recommend this to anyone serious about their anime. There are far better action titles out there to choose from. Highs: Pretty much straight forward Lows: Doesn't excel in any area

This anime reminds me a bit of Karas but even though Karas had a twisted plot with a number of holes it was still enjoyable. Strait Jacket clearly should have been longer to develop the characters just a bit more...it feels more like a preview to a possible 13 or 26 ep series which i would be interested in watching since i like this particular universe. If you want a nice quick slugfest and carnage mixed with magic then this is your show.

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