Coop
Since Halloween's just around the corner, our omnipotent editor thought it would be fun if Lucas and I did some trick-or-treating over in theOceanVeil neighborhood. After all, I hear theyjust got a variety bag chock-full of anime from yesteryear. But I don't know, Lucas... I was expecting to maybe get a Snickers or a Charleston Chew, not an...ear of corn?!

Lucas
Considering it's become a bit of a tradition in my home state of Wisconsin togive away potatoes for Halloween, I don't mind trading one starch for another!

However, the workplace environment in the classicOVABoku no Sexual Harassment is a bit of a horror story!Well, at least from an HR perspective. From afujoshi or general smut-appreciation perspective, it feels like studying the old texts in the most entertaining way possible!

If this show took place anywhere but the porno dimension, my stomach would've been churning right away. However, I couldn't keep a straight (heh) face while reading the over-the-top, smutty dialogue that ran across the screen. In fact, I started screaming when I realized that this is "the corn show." I'd only known thatAMV Hell clip up until now.

Listen, as a bisexual and a professional (and a professional bisexual), I don't know if this is great representation, but I still appreciate it!

More than anything, I'm just shocked that we got an anime that was this overtly gay in the '90s! I knew a greater variety of content was allowed in this release format, but I'm both shocked and thrilled that the novel of the same name bySakura Momo was popular enough to earn this adaptation.

Or that someone in the business seats knew this had a good chance of raking in the dough! Tale as old as time: sex sells!

Also, this office lady is speaking the truth.

We should all aspire to be as inclusive and open-minded as this office lady fromBoku no Sexual Harassment!

Perhaps the most impressive thing about this new offering of classic OVAs fromOceanVeil is thatBoku no Sexual Harassment isn't the only the only super gay anime in this lot!I’m Not Going Back Now is super gay and shockingly affecting and accurate to the disenfranchisement that can come with having a queer identity.

I’m Not Going Back Now is a fairly grounded gay coming-of-age tale, but it deals in melodrama more than it does sleaze. In comparison to the corn show, the most porny element here is probably those '90s midi tracks. I'd imagine there's been more than a few people in Mitsuro's shoes before—locked between his best friend and his girlfriend. Well, give or take the part about the best friend bedding all of his girlfriends at one point or another.For aBL title from the mid-nineties, I'm surprised it dips its toes into these topics rather than focus only on the titillation—of which there is still plenty.

To be clear to our readers, thisOVA is 100% a melodrama. That being said, the themes are on point, and the characters are clearly informed by people who deeply understand this subject matter. I also love that these characters are messy in some big ways, and desperately wish more media's empathetic to queer characters who make terrible choices.

I'm there with you, Lucas. With everything that's going on in the world, I understand why people would want to present a buttoned-up image in queer media. But it's not that simple... People are shitty to each other on occasion, regardless of who they love or how they identify. It's part of why I personally loveShūzō Oshimi'sWelcome Back, Alice, as it features a cast of characters who regularly and horribly screw up with each other. It's a painfully human title.

And to reiterate something I said back when Chris and Italked about Danmei, the people who target queer stories or are looking to raise a stink do not care if it's respectful representation or not—they just want it gone. Why bother to sanitize parts of human experience for them?

Coop, I can't think of a better way to close the queer section of thisOVA discussion than with that sentiment. Hope y'all liked that bit of queer history and vulnerability, as most of what we're going to talk about next is AGGRESSIVELY hetero.

Starting withLittle Bunny Cue!!, which focuses on a delinquent girl possessed by a rabbit and then really wants to fuck the guy who took care of said rabbit. I mentioned in a column last week how I thinkintroducing a woman boobs first is a cardinal sin in anime, but this anime takes it a step further by introducing its heroine's labia first.

While I wasn't exactly taken withLittle Bunny Cue!!, I'll give it points for knowing exactly what it's about right out of the gate: booming bazongas that bounce atop a parade of perverted panty shots.

That dude also has the same expression I had on my face while watching most of this.

I truly cannot believe how many panty shots are in this anime! I only made it through the first episode, but I'm confident there isn't a single named female character in thisLittle Bunny Cue!! who doesn't get hit with an upskirt.

That being said, between the designs of the main girls in this show, as well as how familiar thefanservice felt to me as someone who really got into anime in the mid to late 2000s, I can tell that this 2001OVA really crystallized anime smuttiness in a way that's still being felt today.

I'd be inclined to agree. Though compared to a lot of modern fare, I kind of admire howLittle Bunny Cue!! really puts its whole crotch and chest into it. It's almost like the crew went too far to convey thefanservice in a way that makes me go, "You're not doing this just for the cheap gag, you're going all in—regardless of whether it works or not."

Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing more of this wild, "fanservice is the point" spirit in modern productions. In fact, that spirit might be why I appreciate howThe 100 Girlfriends Who, Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You just goes for it; even if that show isn't exactly my cup of tea.

While I am a big believer in the idea that there's a tipping point where, if an anime has a ridiculous amount offanservice in it, the team behind it should have just make ahentai; I'm all for more works like100 GFs that embraces sexuality and relationships being fun and chuck full of entertaining or insightful situations!

And while few teams probably have the chops to pull off the kind of writing and industry insight necessary to pull off a work like100 GFs, the folks atDangun Pictures who madeRen the Fairy Princess just might be able to do that.Did this work read as a parody to you? I feel like this anime was playing up tropes and medium concepts in a way that nearly felt like affectionate parody.

I can see that, considering you could easily compare the shenanigans ofRen to a series likeUrusei Yatsura orProject A-ko. Similar to those two, this is a mile-a-minute with the gags. Some land, while others fall 30 stories from a rooftop shrine and into the arms of a flying robot.While our main treasure-hunting genki boy, Gou, is off running around with the titular fairy, the audience gets some quality time with the strange cast that holds this one up. Be they one of Gou's many Nurse Joy-esque sisters, the rival fairy, or this guy with weird hair, they're all a hoot.

I got most of my chuckles from the hair guy, who has multiple bits dedicated to both his do and inscrutable accent.But with how those subtitles are written, these moments are more than a bit questionable in translation. I'm trying to think of what would've been a better way to convey that concept without falling into an insensitive stereotype. MaybeBoomhauer him up instead? He kind of reads likeJoe Black as is.

While I do have a soft spot for older anime localizations that didn't quite have "best practices" of today down pat and are often pretty wild as a result, these kinds of questionable choices are more common by the same token. Also, for what it's worth, I read his accent as more of a Gambit-style Cajun thing, but it's still less than great.

And speaking of questionable choices, the sci-fi bikini armor inIczer Girl Iczelion! Maybe I'm the weird one here, but I can't help but think that shoulder pad armor could be better spent covering vital organs.

You know, I don't think these suits look too bad once the bodysuit fully materializes.

I knowIczer fans are apparently not all that crazy about this entry in the series, but I absolutely adore how simple the setup is. An overwhelming alien threat comes to Earth, and a girl with dreams of becoming a professional wrestler is tasked with taking them down!And oh, she has a cadre of fellow warriors working alongside her, too.

If onlyIczelion capitalized more on that rock-solid setup. Our wrestling heroine is kind of a scaredy cat after her first match.

Don't get me wrong, thisOVA definitely has some strong points! While it is pretty risqué, game respects game on the pseudo-magical girl transformation sequence. The idea of using wrestling moves on an alien invader while wearing a sentient mech suit i also deeply funny, and I appreciated that we could get a taste of the unconstrained violence allowed inOVA releases throughIczelion.

It's so weird and specific that I can't help but have some affection for this project, even if I didn't vibe with this one.

Iczelion has a real personality to it, even if the series itself doesn't fully deliver on its ambitions. This title is emblematic of most OVAs, as it comes swinging out of the gate with a great initial idea, but it's either truncated or canceled just as the creatives were figuring out where to go next. To use a title from earlier as an example, the final minutes ofI’m Not Going Back Now featured hooks for future episodes that were never produced.

I agree, and I'm glad you added the "most" qualifier to your description of OVAs, because I was not interested in the premise of our nextOVA and cared forMoekko Company's execution even less!

If I wanted to watch anOVA about a crabby guy with glasses picking on his mysterious maid, I'd rather watchAmazing Nurse Nanako again. I can't believe I just said that, butMoekko doesn't have the Rasputin Yano gas.

It does have creepy loner vibes, though! And it is probably the worst looking out of any of the OVAsOceanVeil just picked up. If you're reading this, you are better off watching any other series we've discussed tonight.

I like that Lilia has Canti-style robot hands, but that's about it, really.

The last two titles of this bunch are all about summer lovin', but in the most default visual novel adaptation style. After watching_summer andHourglass of Summer, I understand a bit more why series likeHigurashi andSchool Days made waves when they broke onto the scene.

These two could almost be interchangeable if it weren't for the time travel underpinnings ofHourglass. Like sand through theHourglass, these are trulyThe Days of Our Lives.

I spent the entirety of the first episode of_summer waiting for theHigurashi style twist to kick in, and then was so dumbfounded when it didn't happen, that I did some research. Both the_summer video game andOVA releases AFTER theHigurashi video game andOVA, respectively, meaning that it's somehow trying to keep this style of harem romcom going afterHigurashi forever altered that genre of work, which I find bizarre.

As forHourglass of Summer, I think I only dug it more than_summer because I watched it immediately after, and it had a much stronger opening of the lead getting socked in the face! Also, apparently, the VNHourglass of Summer was one of the first Japanese dating sims ever officially released in the US, which is pretty cool.

Speaking of interesting tidbits, I had an epiphany while watching this pair of summer-y shows. There are countless titles from the aughts about a potato-kun trying to figure out which girl he'll choose among his childhood friend, the sporty girl, the rich girl, and so on. I might be late to the party on this comparison, but it sure reminds me of how we're currently inundated with Isekai titles for many of the same reasons—they're easy to make, bring in plenty of dough, and have many preestablished lines to color within.

I find it mighty fascinating that these two provide a solid glimpse into a genre that once served as the industry's product of choice.

To build on your point, I also find it interesting that two of the most typical, or at least genre templated, OVAs of late are the most recent works, while gayest,Sexual Harassment andI’m Not Going Back Now are two of the oldest. This isn't me saying blanketly that older anime are better, but, interestingly, we see the motivations and target audience for OVAs change so drastically in the decade that these titles cover.

TheOVA (and nowONA) format is so intriguing as it's a great demonstration of the business in motion. Yes, a studio could swing for the fences with a tight, one-off story, but is that title going to sell? That's where the boobies, blood, and established tropes come in. Nowadays, I don't think it would be much of a stretch to say that line of thinking has long been common in most anime productions—regardless of where any given show airs.

And speaking of where these anime air, props toOceanVeil for making these OVAs more accessible! For better or worse, they're overtly a part of this medium's history and a great way to get a sense of both the breadth and trends in this space.

Absolutely! As is the adult material they host, which has become something of anendangered species in the anime world. I hear that most adult manga is being adapted into adult videos instead ofhentai these days.

But now for a more pressing question, Lucas. Just how am I going to cook this corn?

You're probably best off dunking that corn into a pot of boiling water, and you'd better make sure it's a rolling boil just to be safe. And, just like that water, I hopeOceanVeil stays on this roll of releasing interesting projects that engender goodwill from anime appreciators like us!