Starring Kenji Nojima, Houko Kuwashima, Katsunosuke Hori, Hisayoshi Suganuma, Akimitsu Takase, Chizu Yonemoto, Eiji Itô, Hiroshi Isobe, Hisanori Nemoto, Jōji Nakata, Nobutoshi Kanna
Directed by Koichi Ohata
What we have here is another compilation film that splices together scenes from the TV series to make a feature from the scraps. This of course means that the story is a bit disjointed, but really it’s no more so than films like Fist of the North Star or X: 1999 which did reanimate the story from scratch. What this also means is that the animation is TV-series quality. It isn’t really impressive for TV either, so its quality is noticeably different from other anime films.
A long time ago I tried to watch the TV series of Blue Gender. I don’t remember quite what turned me off to the series, but I remember thinking it was generic and kinda boring. Of course, I’ve learned since then that all anime series take at least the first episode, usually longer, to get going. Watching The Warrior I found that the story did take some interesting turns even though its initial premise looked like any other giant mecha anime with monsters overrunning the Earth.
The core of the plot development is centered on the different philosophies of the main characters. Yuji comes from our time, and he is horrified at the callous way that his rescuer Marlene treats the other people. He thinks they should be helping save the others, but Marlene is more pragmatic. Even saving themselves will be nearly impossible, and she has no time to waste on the random survivors on the surface.
The second arc of the film is where things start feeling way too rushed and unexplained. It’s rather odd, too, that the film is only an hour and a half. Since this is just reusing animation from the series, I would have expected more content. It’s not like they didn’t have any material to work with, and the story could have used a good bit more time to help with explanations and pacing.
Blue Gender: The Warrior has a lot of issues that hold it back, but there are some good elements. I can’t give it much of a recommendation, but if you’re a mecha action fan it does offer some cool robots and plenty of vicious fights with an unusual focus on a more down-to-earth style of warfare.