AIKa

If you intend to watch this series: Be warned! Depending on your point of view, it's either a catastrophal train-wreck of an anime series or actually so damn bad it's absolutely hilarious again. It is apparently trying to be an ecchi light-hearted action-comedy, but it puts it on so thick that it can only count as a parody of that genre. If it excels at anything , it's how the producers managed to cram so very many panty shots into it: Girls in other series wear t-shirts and sweaters that reach farther down than the skirts of the characters in this series. It also helps that the villain'sunderlings are all female and wear the same skimpy uniforms. And if all else fails, there's still frog's perspective. I actually got so captivated by the sheer amount that I started counting them... By the end of the first episode I had reached 140 and stopped counting. With an episode length of roughly 30 minute that makes about 4.6 panties on screen every minute. That almost deserves credit... but that's not all! Aside from the general stereotypical stupidity of the plot (Some sort of catastrophe has destroyed the planet a little and made the water rise, so now special divers called Salvagers dive up valuable sunk junk but you'd barely even notice that if it wouldn't be mentioned occassionally) it's plot has some very precious highlights of mental retardation: The main Villain, Hagen, is an effeminate man who actually wants to destroy the world with the power of a mysterious substance called Lagu only so that he can repopulate it with the offspring of - yes, you might have guessed - himself and every member of the all-female crew of his spaceship/submarine/headquarters. Which sadly, seems to include his own sister. (Although details are shaky. They're both test tube children as far as got) But alas, that's not yet the deepest deep of this really awful plot, the main part hasn't even been mentioned yet: The heroine is in possession of a sentient artifact created by science (could as well be magic) that gives her super powers (and also transforms her into an tanned, sexier version of herself with long blue hair and a white bikini). It has the form of a golden bustier. And of course, Hagen, who eventually crushes on the name-giving heroine of the series, eventually makes his own super-powered panty to give his sister. Add to that wacky hi-jinx of various useless side characters like Aika's stupid meganekko-sidekick, a manly salvager who yells "Bip-Bop-Balooba!" while fighting in rhytm, a mysterious (also female) secret agent that inflitrates Hagen's group and is as inept as all the others and you have a piece of truely outstandingly stupid piece of Animated Entertainment. I kept thinking constantly: "They're.. they're not actually serious, are they?"

I make no bones about Agent Aika being my all-time favorite anime guilty pleasure and how much I just plain LOVE this show. Beyond the paper-thin rip-off of the plot from Moonraker, this show is all about hot looking, long legged girls in ridiculously short skirts and high heels for as far as the eye can see, not to mention the almost endless number of panty shots and the imaginative camera angles used to display same (Just for fun, I actually tried counting all the panty shots during one viewing and lost count after around 250!). To call Aika outrageous would be an understatement, thisshow isn't enlightening, emotionally gripping or even intelligent, but for sheer fun on an amazing scale, Aika fills the prescription!

Overview: Today, the man regarded as the "master" of anime spoofs is Imaishi Hiroyuki. His works Gurren Lagann, Panty and Stocking, and Kill La Kill (despite how much I personally hate them) are widely beloved by otaku in both Japan and the US. Who was his predecessor though? In the 1980s, the lord of the spoof was named Katsuhiko Nishijima. Mr. Nishijima created the anime Project A-ko, which despite a rather cool reception by today's otaku, was absolutely beloved back in 1986. A-ko perfectly skewered all the anime cliches and tropes from the early 1980s and late 1970s. A-ko also made fun of animation techniques andfeatured many inside jokes for animators and anime staff workers. Back in its day, A-ko was THE definitive anime spoof. Unfortunately for Nishijima, he wasn't able to build on his early success. He took some time off to direct hentai and came back in the 1990s to try spoof and "satirize" echii anime by recycling his old formula of lampshading cliches and going way over the top. However, audience tastes had changed and despite a decent reception in Japan, his next work Agent Aika was largely despised in the US. Here is a look at a shitty anime that may have gotten a much better reception if it had only come out at a different time. Plot and characters: 1/10 Much like his final attempt at directing, the absolutely disastrous Najika Blitz Tactics, Nishijima completely threw plot and character development out the window to focus on one thing: Panty shots. Agent Aika manages to have over 300 panty shots in a run time of about 2 hours. BRILLIANT! Much like Hiroyuki, Nishijima believed that the definition of a good spoof was simply going "full retard" and beating tired tropes to death for the sake of comedy. The basic story is that Aika is a secret agent tasked with recovering a powerful artifact called the Lagu. She must find it before an extremely cheesy villain uses it to wipe out all of humanity, except himself and 100 beautiful women, and make Earth his own giant harem. All of the echii cliches are here in full force and the characters are the most cardboard stereotypes possible. The problem with simply abusing cliches in a shallow and repetitive manner is that it isn't "brilliant" spoofing. It is simply a shitty anime that is self aware of its own badness. Unless the audience has VERY low standards, that really shouldn't be considered good enough to warrant praise! Animation: 4/10 Even for the 1990s, the animation and art in Agent Aika really isn't very good. Occasionally the goofy animation actually works with the comedy, but mostly it just looks ugly and lazy. Enjoyment: 4/10 As horrible as this anime is, I actually find it a bit easier to enjoy than the likes of Kill La Kill because it doesn't have annoying fanboys screaming in my ear how bloody clever it is! The fact that it is simply, unapologetic-ally SHIT makes it easier to laugh at! Overall: 3/10 Although Japan actually liked this piece of shit and gave it enough fanfare to warrant multiple sequels, America stood strong and said "NO!" to this low quality style of spoofing. If only Panty and Stocking and Kill la Kill had come out in the 1990s when they would have been quickly discarded and bashed just like Aika. Of course, I'm sure Mr. Nishijima wishes he had released this bullshit in the 2010s when it would have received a MUCH warmer reception in the West. My point is that there was once a time when we Americans could recognize that complete idiocy that happens to be self aware was NOT the same as a brilliant and clever spoof. We can reach that level of criticism again!

**Spoiler Warning** This is probably one of the worst anime that I have ever watched and that's saying something because an anime has got to do a lot of things wrong in order for me to actually hate it. The plot-line of this anime is a catastrophe has happened on planet earth that has caused the majority of the landmass to be underwater and the main character Aika has the job of being a salvager in order to excavate artifacts from the watery ruins. However she is asked to retrieve a specific artifact but unfortunately someone else is after this same artifact and wants to use totake over the world. I really wanted to like this anime just on its premise alone because it actually sounded really interesting. I really wanted to like this because it comes from my favorite timeline of anime. Let's look at the good of this anime because unfortunately there is not a lot of good to look forward to in this anime. The world that this anime takes place in is actually quite interesting, but its barely touched upon. To have a planet that still retains civilization on very small land masses is actually a pretty interesting concept but its not touched upon very often. The art and animation in this anime is actually very beautiful for its time with very vibrant colours and excellent designs with regards to some of the vehicles used in this anime. The music is really good with a jazzy pop feel to it and I actually like one of the ending songs from this anime. Those are the only things that I actually liked about it. The biggest problem with this anime is its literally a few steps away from being a hentai. If for some strange reason, you have a panty shot fetish than this anime is for you. Fan-service is usually expected with regards to any anime you want to watch but usually some fan-service has some humour to it, but this anime has no humour to it. This anime has more groan inducing moments than anything else. Literally all of the characters are generally unlikable with no proper character development and the plot is beyond absurd even by anime standards. The main bad guy wants to destroy the world so that he can make his own perfect utopia by impregnating every member of his crew once the world is destroyed. All members of his crew are female. The first 4 episodes focuses on Aika trying to prevent this from happening and I'm not even kidding when I say that one of the episodes is called naked mission. The next three episodes focuses on the female crew trying to take revenge on Aika for killing their master. By the end of it they just give up with no significant build up because they know they'll never beat her. As a fan of english dubbing this anime has one of the worse english dubs I've ever heard of. The action in the anime isn't very good at all and it was a real pain to get through. For some apparent reason that isn't really explained completely, but Aika wears this object called alternate metal that gives her super powers but its never really explained why. It's just something that contributes to the blatant fan-service in this anime. Overall despite the world building, the colourful art style, and some really good music this anime is a complete waste of time. However if your in the mood to watch something beyond bad then I'm giving you a fair warning. Favorite Character: Aika Least Favorite Character: Nina

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