Strike Witches: Delightfully Crazy

Do you remember that episode early on in Welcome to the NHK where Satou and Yamazaki are sitting in a cafe in Akibhabara, trying to come up with a main character for their eroge? Remember after being immersed in the Otaku Holy Land, Satou basically threw every single gal-game cliche at Yamazaki, who’s furiously sketching as Satou suggests a half-alien maid-robot with cat ears who is a childhood friend and is possessed of a spirit of a fox and…

Well: take that idea. Give them a high budget–a very high one. Give it a genuine classical music soundtrack (Rachmaninov’s 18th Variation on a Theme by Paganini in this case), a serious war story, and add WWII-style dogfight sequences. Add fan service.

What you get is what you see above–Strike Witches, an upcoming OAV. Every single moe convention seems to be thrown into this one, as well as mecha drama, and even more–it works. It’s beautiful to look at and even, at the end, a little stirring, which is far beyond anything I expect from this genre. This is an 8.5 minute triumph. It shouldn’t work, but it dang it, it does. I watched slack-jawed at the sheer audacity, ridiculousness, and delight that went into this production.

I must watch the full length episodes of this when it comes out. Now.

HT to my friend moritheil for introducing this to me.

Author: gendomike

Michael lives in the Los Angeles area, and has been into anime since he saw Neon Genesis Evangelion in 1999. Some of his favorite shows include Full Metal Alchemist, Honey and Clover, and Welcome to the NHK!. Since 2003 he has gone to at least one anime convention every year. A public radio junkie, which naturally led to podcasting, he now holds a seminary degree and is looking to become Dr. Rev. Otaku Bible Man any day now. Michael can be reached at mike.huang@animediet.net. You can also find his Twitter account at @gendomike.

3 thoughts on “Strike Witches: Delightfully Crazy

  1. Bakarashii!!

    I still can’t believe this is real. This has to be one of those joke/ersatz anime series like “Kujibiki Unbalanced” from Genshiken or “Getsumen Toheiki Miina” from Densha Otoko right?

    ***UPDATE***
    I guess this is real and based on a real genre:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecha_Musume

    I swear the Japanese are on some other level when it comes to thinking up something like this…

  2. AFAIK there are no full length episodes of Strike Witches planned. The 8.5 minute OVA is basically a promo for mecha musume trading figures.

    Sad, I know…

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