Assemble Insert

I have to disagree with the only other reviewer (at the time of this writing.) This is a really fun anime! And I actually was laughing out loud while watching it! The other reviewer said something to the effect of Americans not understanding the pop idol phenomenon. Hey, didn't that rock-pop phenomenon actually start in America? It has mutated in Japan, surely, in that country's own way, but not to the point where this simple, fun, silly parody would go over American's heads. And no, trust me, I watched it with a friend who hadn't seen much anime before and we were both laughing out loud at some points. It's not brilliant, mind you, but it's good light fun for some laughs. Enjoy!

This was a wonderfully charming little OVA. It's an hour long and consists of two episodes, which sounds short but feels exactly as long as it needs to be. Assemble Insert is surprisingly entertaining in an endearing sort of way, and while I didn't laugh as much as I thought I would, I did smile quite a bit ~ it's silly, light-hearted fun.

The story takes place in Tokyo, which has been under the attack of an evil criminal organization known as "Demon Seed." They use large mechanical robots to steal artifacts, gold and money under the leadership of the elderly (and scheming) Dr. Kyozaburo Demon. The police have been losing popularity with the public, as every encounter against Demon Seed's robots leads to wanton destruction on the Tokyo streets. To combat this threat, a special task force led by the comically inept but resolute Chief Hattori has been assigned the mission of developing a counter-attack force. The plan? ...Hold auditions to find a new idol/combat officer, and win over the hearts of the public while battling Demon Seed! They soon employ the help of young High School senior Maron Namikaze ~ a shy, sincere young girl who happens to have the strength of a mountain gorilla (actually, quite a bit ways stronger than that). After issuing her a high-tech combat suit, she begins a rise to idol popularity while trying to protect Tokyo from the forces of evil!

I went into this show thinking it was going to be a wild and crazy parody series, but it was quite a bit ways more down to earth than I was expecting. The show employs a lot of tropes for the era, but in very straightforward ways that aren't necessarily parodic. The opening sequence does seem to parody sentai series (like Power Rangers), and the overall plot seems to be a comedic twist of the idol singer craze that was popular throughout the 80's and 90's. There did, however, seem to be a few nods to other popular manga/anime of the era such as Ranma 1/2 (there's a minor character that resembles Gosunkugi, and one of the sentai soldiers in the opening sequence reminded me of Kodachi), Yawara! A Fashionable Judo Girl (most certainly the professor's final remark at the end of the OVA was similar to Jigoro's constant goading of Yawara to win the Gold Medal at the Barcelona Olympics, and one of the sentai soldiers in the opening sequence reminded me of Yawara herself) and finally Giant Robo/Nadia of the Secret Blue Water (Demon Seed wears somewhat similar outfits to Big Fire and Gargoyle). After having watched the video, I wondered as to what other types of parodies might have gone over my head simply because of an unfamiliarity with many of the popular works that came out during that era, and I'd like to watch it again just to see if I can spot anything else I might have missed.

I was worried that the show might be perverted since the plot revolves around a high-school idol singer, but it surprisingly wasn't perverted at all (save for one of the characters trying to pick up an Adult VHS cassette at the beginning of the first episode). The plot was surprisingly charming and lovable, and I liked/respected almost all of the characters. Even though Maron was the only female in Chief Hattori's all-male team, none of the men seemed to have an interest (perverted or otherwise) in Maron herself (well, except maybe for Masami Yuki's character, albeit it seemed to be an interest of the 'obsessive fan' variety).

This DVD may also be of interest to people interested in Anime history and late 80's/early 90's anime in general, since the member's of Chief Hattori's team are actually based on real people that worked on the Patlabor series(another manga/anime of the era, that happened to also be created by the same author of Assemble Insert, Masami Yuki). The characters are based on Fukuda Takahashi, Yutaka Izubuchi, Shoji Kawamori, Yutaka Yoneda and Masami Yuki himself. You can find a little more info about their relation to Masami Yuki and the Patlabor project in the insert that comes with the DVD set.

Overall, Assemble Insert was a really enjoyable watch. It's not the laugh-a-minute, over-the-top roller coaster I was expecting, but I love it for being an endearing, down-to-earth approach to silly action anime.

This is like watching America's Got Talent or Britain's Got Talent-> where the winner of the contest gets to be a superhero to go fight the evil Dr. It takes a superhero, since although the evil Dr. Demon advertises his name and has his name out on the front of his house the police can't find it.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 7 reviews  3.4 out of 5 stars