Saturday Anime: Iria - Zeiram the Animation.

This series is one of the shows that most deserves to be mentioned in an edition of Saturday Anime (which I am going to try to do more consistently, I swear).  One of the first 'True' anime that I saw, the first DVD I bought, and still one of my favorite shows All Around.  Dan and I watched this again last night, so with my latest of many viewings fresh in my mind, I thought I would talk a bit about it.

The titular protagonist of the series is Iria, a hunter from the planet Myce in a distant galaxy.  As the show opens, she is apprenticed to her brother, Gren and his partner Bob.  She is strong willed and tough as nails, a true heroine, not the Kung Fu mistress or Dragon lady stereotypes.  She fights with an impressive arsenal of Guns, explosives, and a segmented Katana, similar to the sword used by Ivy of Soul Calibur fame.  And while she is easily the toughest person (note the word Person) in the show, when she isn't busy kicking ass and taking names, she can still be endearingly feminine.  For example, at one point in the show after fighting tooth and nail for the better part of 15 minutes, the first thing she thinks of is that she could use a shower.

Early in the first episode, Iria, Gren, and Bob take on a hush-hush mission to rescue the occupants of a high-jacked ship known as the Karma.  Expecting space pirates, industrial espionage, or a mercenary force, they instead find that the majority of the crew has been slaughtered by a single assailant.

It is Zeiram, a bloodthirsty unstoppable killing machine of unknown origins.

This is Zeiram.  Holy Schnikies!

There is something so cool about this antagonist.  He has no ambitions.  No Agenda.  No personal beef with anyone in particular.  No tragic past.  No tortured psychotic personality.  No reason to kill.

But that doesn't stop him.  The best way to describe Zeiram is as a Force of Nature.  He is pure Malice, unfocused hatred incarnate, unfettered instinct in an indestructible body.  He kills everything in his path, not for kicks or honor or really for any reason, simply because it's what he does.  And he is damn good at it.  Zeiram is an extremely intimidating figure, huge in stature, accompanied by an eerie chant and a hissing laugh that freezes the blood of his victims.  And there is only one person who has ever taken him on, one on one, and lived.  Iria.

The show has a very unique visual style that blends traditional eastern art and architecture with otherworldly technology, and character design is excellent, particularly Iria and Zeiram.  Audio is excellent, with a number of memorable pieces of background music and an insanely catchy opening theme song that, to this day, I can't get enough of.

It bears mentioning that this series was one of the shows that made me the Anime Fan I am today.  I saw it first on the Sci Fi channel during the Saturday Anime days.  It is amongst the original handful of series that hooked me on the medium, including the likes of Tenchi Muyo, Dominion Tank Police, Gunsmith Cats, Ghost in the Shell and Neon Genesis Evangelion; placing it in some fine company.  And I remember it fondly as one of the first shows that featured a powerful and well developed female in the lead role of an animated series at a time when animated women were sidekicks at best and damsels in distress at worst.  I recommend it to anyone who can get a hold of it and who wants a taste of Great old school anime and a Badass Female Hero.

And now, your moment of AMV zen.