Vandread

Since the days of space pioneering, men and women have been cut off from one another. They have developed their own seprate colonies and cultures, they are also mortal enemies. Welcome to the world of Vandread, which offers a original take on the mecha genre by pitting the two genders together in the ultimate battle of the sexes. The plot follows Hedeki, a boastful teen male who's a stowaway on a battleship that's off to engage the women, unfortunately it gets hijacked by an all female pirate ship. When a far greater threat against humanity as a whole comes into play, its up to the female pirates and their male captives to try to put aside their many differences and work as a team. Vandread's unusual premise has a lot of potential humor and promise, it's somewhat of a shame that its execution is simply better than average. The show never finds a calm, steady pace, and as a result feels a little choppy at times, unsure if it wants to be a straight up mecha show or a character/situation driven dramady. The shows strengths are obviously in the second department, the mecha action scenes are frankly, boring. It doesn't help that the The CGI is sometimes of very poor quality . This would be easy to look over but they are excessively frequent, leading to the idea that they serve more as episode filler than being actually integral to the story/plot. Despite this, Vandread is still a worth a look for its characters, original premise and humor.

Grade:B-

Reviewed: episodes 1-13(complete) Format: English Dub, DVD