Appleseed (1988)

Following a long and bitter worldwide war the city of Olympus is created as a Utopia: the prototype for a perfect society. Many of its citizens are “Biodroids’ (sic), clones who are designed to be perfect beings and live alongside ordinary humans who have been rescued from the ruined outside world. The whole city is controlled by a supercomputer named Gaia, which ensures safety and equality for all; however, a disillusioned human police officer named Calon Mautholos and a band of terrorists launch an attack to bring down Gaia and hand power back over to the humans. Only Deunan Knute and Briareos Hecatonchires, two officers in a police SWAT team, stand in the way of their plans.

Many fans will know the name Appleseed either from the original Matsumune Shirow manga series or the new feature film directed by Shinji Aramaki; while it makes a brave attempt at combining action and Shirow’s famously complex storyline, there’s no escaping the fact that the OVA falls short in terms of animation quality and story.

That said it wouldn’t be fair to compare the visuals of this film with the dazzling CGI of the new one since it predates the Appleseed movie by around sixteen years. As might be expected, the animation is somewhat jerky but gets smoother and slicker when it matters most (i.e. during the action scenes). The soundtrack and character designs are also very much of the age, which may put off casual viewers but give it a retro charm.

While the focus is very much on the gunplay and mecha street fights there are some interesting philosophical themes concerning the relations between biodroids and humans in society, and questions the ethics of Olympus as a whole. It is designed as the perfect society, but what happens when the human occupants are not perfect enough? Is a secure life in paradise really better than the freedom of the old world? It is this set of issues that caused the personal tragedy that drove Calon to make his attempt at bringing down Gaia but his comrades in arms, who include the ruthless Sebastian, have an agenda of their own which adds some extra depth to things.

At the heart of it though, this adaptation of Appleseed is all about action and to its credit it does deliver, more or less. The English dub tries to beef up the story with swearing added to the dialogue but as an old-fashioned sci-fi action film it isn’t bad to start with and such changes sound a little forced and unnecessary. Ultimately though, there isn’t really enough time to delve very far into the intricacies of the plot and they serve mainly as means to set up another armed stand-off or chase; if you want to learn more about the world of Olympus and its inhabitants you would have to look elsewhere.

In Summary

The OVA of Appleseed will no doubt be seen as a trip down memory lane by nostalgia fans, but sadly that is its main selling point. For more depth to the story, better visuals and more characterisation the new film or, better still, Shirow’s original manga will offer much more. For all its faults though, the OVA is still entertaining in its own limited way and if you can see past the fact that it is very dated next to more recent efforts it is quite a lot of fun to watch.