A few weeks ago, I downloaded a bunch of old anime, most of which I have not gotten around to watching yet. Among them was Dragon's Heaven, a single 35-minute OVA, which I decided to try out just now. Throughout the whole time, I had a broad and delighted smile on my face.
It is very short, the story simple, and the characters few. Thousand years before the main events, a war raged between man and machine, on the side of the former fighting SH06H cyberoid “SHAIAN”, his rival on the battlefield being El Medine. SHAIAN's pilot is killed, and thus he decides to fall aslumber. Though humanity ultimately wins the war, it is not until over a millennium later that the young lady Ikuru passes the site of his sleep, and he thus awakens. The city Ikuru hails from is being attacked by the Brazil Empire; SHAIAN agrees to help protect it with Ikuru as his pilot, moreso as he learns that El Medine is still around, and has become a general of the Brazilian Emperor. That's all there is to it, without any plot twists, or narrative highlights.
However, even if you were to deny this simplicity to be charming in and for themselves, the anime would more than compensate for it through its artistic excellence. Its style is one of a kind, from the animatronic(!) opening, over the drawings which look like they have been inked, to the simply gorgeous designs of anything every crossing the screen (a large part of which is gritty war machines). If the art is not among the most splendid of animation, then it still stands out for being unlike anything else. (I guess it helps that I have a kink for the aesthetics of war, which this caters to delightfully with its numerous battles.) All while the music is like the greatness of any and all eighties' soundtracks condensed (the beautiful orchestral pieces nonwithstanding)—simply an orgy for the ears.
It's strange, it's short, but it's an outstanding and ensouled piece of art well worth seeing, which fails not to entertain greatly during the half of an hour it lasts. The effort put into it—of which one can catch a glimpse of during the credits roll, which shows the anime's creators building the robot models for the opening—is admirable, and not wasted the least. My most heartfelt suggestion; heartfelt for Dragon's Heaven has already lodged itself in my heart, unlikely to be expelled from there again.
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