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AKA: 極黒の翼 バルキサス (Kyokuguro no Tsubasa Valkisas), Jet Black Wings of Valkisas
Genre: Fantasy action
Length: OAV, 45 minutes
Distributor: Distributed by Central Park Media.
Content Rating: 16+ (nudity, violence, adult situations)
Related Series: N/A
Also Recommended: Demon Hunter Yohko, Leda: The Fantastic Adventure of Yohko, Plastic Little
Notes: Based on the manga of the same name by Kinji Yoshimoto with art by Satoshi Urushihara.
Rating:

Legend of Lemnear

Synopsis

The titular character, Lemnear, witnesses the slaughter of her people by the evil wizard Gardein and embarks on a mission of revenge against him and his master, the dark lord Valkisas. Lemnear is the prophesied Champion of Silver, and she must enlist the help of other Champions in her quest.


Review

More like Legend of Lamenear! Very rarely does anything with the "Legend of" prefix actually amount to anything legendary, and in the annals of anime "legends", this ranks with Crystania and DUO as being one of the very worst.

It's all very cliched - an Evil Mage type (the Darth Vader of the story) with massive 80s shoulder pads attacks a village and enslaves a bunch of people, and Lemnear is out for revenge, or so we are told in the first minute of this film. This is well and fine if you set it up properly, but any "character development" is easily missed amid all the shots of chicks in metal bikinis (or less) going into battle or whatever the hell it is we're supposed to be watching. Hey, if the creators of this piece couldn't be bothered with explaining the plot properly, then I couldn't be bothered to care, right? All they want us to do is watch the pretty pictures, apparently.

Really, this wouldn't be such a problem, except that unlike another Satoshi Urushihara "masterpiece" (Plastic Little) the nudity and action isn't even particularly well animated, which sort of defeats the point of "watching the pretty pictures". The design work is *okay*, despite the datedness of the animation, but that hardly makes up for the rest of this hot mess. Also, granted, this was made in 1987, but that still doesn't excuse the fact that this still looks murky as all hell due to the dark color palette.

Oh, yes, and the bad guys make a host of incredibly stupid decisions that make absolutely no sense (apparently, mirroring the creators' lack of planning); the plot holes here are so massive they verge upon black hole territory.

Bizarrely enough, the original Japanese title (Kyokuguro no Tsubasa Valkisas, or "The Jet Black Wings of Valkisas") is actually in reference to the bad guy (who isn't even the dude in the beginning - that's Gardein, apparently, for all that matters), which is kind of like calling Star Wars "The Onyx Cape of Emperor Palpatine".

So, to summarize, this horrible, embarrassing, exploitationist OVA has lots of nudity, lots of violence, and very little in the way of decent plotting, storytelling, or even voice acting. Frankly, this whole thing feels like an amateurish and obvious rehash of Heavy Metal's Taarna sequence (nearly to the point of legal actionability), with marginally better animation, but whoppingly inferior storytelling. It may have turned a few heads in the late 80s with its animation, but without even that to fall back on 24 years later, is a complete waste of time today.

If you want cleavage and swords, you'd be far better off chucking this DVD into a lake and going to the nearest Renaissance Festival. Even Urushihara completists would be hard pressed to enjoy this.Carlos/Giancarla Ross

Recommended Audience: Lots of violence and nudity, so I wouldn't recommend this to younger audiences even if it were worth recommending to anyone at all.



Version(s) Viewed: R1 DVD
Review Status: Full (1/1)
Legend of Lemnear © 1987 AIC
 
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