OVA Count: 5
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I’ve spent more time than I care to think about watching anime in my life thus far. Some of the best available anime either ends up being too short or too long to be released as a theatrical anime movie. These direct-to-video shorts and miniseries comprise the world of OVAs (Original Video Animations). I’ve seen both astoundingly spectacular and horrifically terrible OVAs. I’m giving you the full benefit of my anime experiences in the form of this list of mini-reviews. You’ll find the best (and only the best) OVAs in existence organized below according to studio, director and release date.
(Note: These anime features are sometimes referred to as OAVs or Original Animation Videos, but the most popular acronym by far is OVA, so that is what is used in this guide)
Pretty much all of the movies that I’ll talk about from Production I.G are for teens to adults. Kids wouldn’t get much from these movies even if they did watch them, really. Despite that fact, they are all also some of the most beautiful and well-written anime OVAs that you are likely to see.
Kenji Kamiyama
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. – The Laughing Man (2005)
Kôkaku kidôtai: Stand alone complex – The laughing man (攻殻機動隊)
This OVA serves as a “quick” 3-hour summary of the occurrences in the first season of GiTS S.A.C.. I never had the opportunity to watch the whole series, so this movie served a very useful purpose in catching me up relatively quickly. It follows Section 9 as they try to track down a Super-Class-A hacker that can almost bend reality to his will by hacking others’ eyes and cyber-minds. The story was interesting, the dialogue, while plentiful, was intriguing and both the fights and the visuals were great. When you can find the time to be immersed even more deeply into the GiTS world, I would certainly recommend that you pick this one up.
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. – Individual Eleven (2006)
Kôkaku kidôtai: S.A.C. 2nd GIG – Individual eleven (攻殻機動隊)
This OVA serves as a digest version for the second season of GiTS S.A.C., 2nd GiG. It essentially does as good of a job as the first OVA to condense an entire season into an acceptable movie length. This one follows Section 9 as they try to stop both radical revolutionaries and members of their own government from slaughtering millions of refugees. It delivers quite well in the sound, visual, and plot department, although I found it to have a good measure more suspense than action as compared to the other entries in the GiTS series. Still a very good, but involved, time. If you ever have a spare six hours in a day, it’s not a bad time at all to watch both of the TV series OVAs consecutively.
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. – Solid State Society (2006)
Kōkaku Kidōtai: Sutando Arōn Konpurekkusu Soriddo Sutēto Sosaieti (攻殻機動隊)
The most current OVA in the GiTS saga serves as an epilogue to the anime series and has much higher production values than the series in both sound and picture. This one has Major Kusanagi apparently going rogue and being hunted by Section 9, including Batou, while strange things are happening with the country’s elderly citizens and children are being randomly kidnapped all over the place. Perhaps the most complex GiTS story-wise, it is absolutely worth checking out, but you’ll be a tad lost if you haven’t seen all of the other GiTS movies and OVAs previously.
Shinkai’s films, while usually breathtakingly beautiful, are all intensely depressing and sad. He has been dubbed “the new Miyazaki” by many in the anime biz, but he considers that to be an exaggeration, as do I. His films are very deep, beautiful and well done, but as such are not really comparable to the generally family fare that comes from Studio Ghibli. They are also all fine for family viewing, if your family likes watching depressing and long anime movies.
Voices of a Distant Star (2002)
Hoshi no Koe (ほしのこえ)
Yeah, I said Jin-Roh was sad, but this is even more sad. Covering a theme of the separation of lovers, with about as large of a distance as one can fathom (perhaps even larger), plus some mecha overtones, this OVA is pretty close to a masterpiece. The animation is unique and fantastic, but it’s the kind of anime I only really want to watch once because it left me feeling pretty depressed afterward. ^_^ Still great, though, and recommended to everyone.
YamatoWorks is perhaps the smallest anime production company featured in this guide. At around 5 people, YamatoWorks was started by Shuhei Morita and Daisuke Sajiki to be a small elite team to make unique, very well cel-shaded CG OVAs. Kakurenbo was their only exclusive work, but the team’s members have worked on a few other OVAs made by studio Sunrise.
Shuhei Morita
Kakurenbo: Hide & Seek (2004)
Kakurenbo (カクレンボ)
Kakurenbo is a striking OVA in many ways. The most obviously striking feature of the anime is its animation style that is computer generated, but cel-shaded in such a way that from most angles it looks just like a traditionally animated anime. Another striking feature of this OVA is the story which is deceptively dark. Without giving too many of the plot’s surprises away, this OVA follows a group of children as they play hide and seek wearing inari (fox) masks in a seemingly abandoned city. Abandoned, that is, except for the hungry demons that lurk in the streets. With engaging animation and a chilling story that borrows liberally in some parts from the Matrix, Kakurenbo should be on anyone’s watch list who is old enough to see good and scary anime.
