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Agent Aika: Naked Missions Movie Streaming.
Movie Title: Agent Aika: Naked Missions Agent Aika: Naked Missions is available for streaming or downloading. |
First off it’s worth mentioning that this DVD includes Naked Mission and Lace in Space and is 120 mins long, not 60 mins as stated in the technical details on this site.
Okay…where should I start? Well, let’s get this over and done with. Panties. Yes, there’s lots of them, and as other reviewers have mentioned, if you are likely to be offended by (or feel uncomfortable viewing) a seemingly endless number of shots of white panty covered crotches, skip this and move on. There’s a lot. More than a lot, actually. There’s tons of them. Trust me.
However, it’s worth saying that all this gratuity doesn’t spoil Aika in any way. It’s not a randomly tacked on interest grabbing ploy. It’s an fundamental part of the whole deal. If you’re going to view it as a full-on action based story, and that alone, then you will probably be quite disappointed. But, if you accept it for what it really is – a pervy, sleazed-up, cheesy parody with a Bond style plot skimming along behind it all – then you’ll be just fine.
You’re certainly not going to be buying this for just the story. You buy it for the whole package. Panties and all…
Oh, there is also some nudity as well, but it’s nothing to get flustered about. All pretty basic really. And anyway, the impact of what little there is gets pretty much overridden by a continual stream of white-knickered nether regions; and that’s far more rude.
Moving on though, the art is well above average and cleanly and crisply executed. Colours are good and well chosen. The character animation is pretty much without fault, very funny in places (particularly facial expressions) and is generally very slick, especially (as you would expect and hope) during fight scenes. My only concerns lay with some of the English voice acting, and I mean some. Most of it is just fine and well matched. Especially Gusto. The English voice dub really made that character for me. Unexpected and very funny. However, Rion’s English voice actor did manage to miss the mark in a few places, and there were a couple of occasions where she really didn’t match the emotion of the character’s visuals. Saying that though, the original Japanese voice actor missed the mark as well on occasions, so I won’t hold that against her too much.
As for the music… Well, I didn’t notice a huge amount of it during any of the episodes, but it never seemed absent. So, I guess it worked okay. The opening theme (extended for the included music ‘video’) rocked though. Very upbeat with enough electric guitar work to keep the whole thing moving along nice and slickly. Good work there. Unlike a lot of anime titles, it actually added to the feel of the whole work, rather than just plodding along with it.
Overall, this is sexy and kooky enough to be a worthwhile purchase with plenty of good set-piece scenes to boost its replay value. Whether you like it or not isn’t going to be down to how easily you’re offended. Most anime fans, whether they be male or female, accept that fan service, in varying degrees, is pretty much always going to be part of the deal. The deciding factor is going to be your overall expectations of the whole thing.
As it is, it’s a cleanly executed, humourous, gratuitous panty shot filled Bond style satire with both serious and fun characters and a reasonably tight plot holding it all together. See it as that and buy it as that and you’ll be more than happy.
I bought this DVD as a replacement for a much borrowed tape (which was bought primarily to complete my Aika collection and to satisfy my curiosity). Reviewing it again though was just as impactful as the first time around.
Trials 5, 6 & 7 really do redefine ‘fan service’ way beyond what most of us would consider normal, especially Trial 6. The sheer amount of up-the-skirt camera angles, upturned bums and crotch shots has to be seen to be believed. It’s quite ludicrous.
Okay, that doesn’t really bother me, as such. I’ve reached a time in my life where very little shocks me any more. But, as with the first time around, I must admit that I found it a little difficult to justify why I was watching it, other than for the purposes of pure sexual titillation.
Trials 1-4 worked fine for me, even with the incredible amount of panty shots, due to there being a reasonably cohesive plot running in the background, some basic character development and silly visual humour. That kept the whole thing rolling along in a obvious direction, which was good. Also, as a stand-alone concept, this particular mini-series (pun not intended) could even be considered a ‘classic’, or at least a defining moment in anime history.
However, the plot behind Trials 5-7 really is nothing more than an excuse for an ever increasing number of white knickered bums and crotches. Which is absolutely fine, if you accept it for being just that.
As it is, the latter I can easily deal with. I’m male and I’m quite happy to admit that I like looking at pretty girls in short skirts, animated or not. Most guys do. Neither do I have any real objections to having numerous shots of tightly fitted panties paraded before me. It’s a purely sexual thing. Deal with it. But the singular lack of any really creditable direction (even allowing for the ‘revenge’ angle) did tend to get a little boring in places. The whole thing is basically just one big glorified cat-fight, and just a little more depth would have gone a long way.
The mildly saving grace of this batch is Trial 7 in which Gusto makes a welcome return, along with secret agent Maypia – although neither of them really do that much this time around. From that moment on, *some* of the silly humour that was present in the first four episodes reappears and manages to lift the whole thing up a notch. Unfortunately, it’s minimal and arrives a bit too late in the ’story’ to do much else.
Visually though, the artwork and animation retains the good standards of the first four episodes. So no real complaints there. The voice acting is on par with the first batch too and, once again, Gusto’s English dub is ridiculously funny. Overall though, the whole thing looks very pretty, and the new theme tune works nicely as well.
So, should you buy it?
Well, if you bought Naked Missions (Trials 1-4), it’s probably worth it for the sake of owning them all. If you like nothing more than sitting around for an hour and a quarter looking at gratuitous shots of knicker gussets, go ahead and buy it. You’ll adore it. If you want to own a piece of animated ecchi history, again, go buy it. However, if you’re looking for a good story and that alone, then forget it. You will be sorely disappointed.
Once more, as with the previous collection, whether you like it or not really depends on what you’re expecting. That’s what matters. Get that right and you’ll be fine.
On a final note though, I’m going to be objective about this. Basically, for what it does, it does it exceptionally well. There’s no doubting that. It’s patently obvious that the single reason for these extra episodes was to be as outrageous and as gratuitous as possible, and on that note it scores a big fat 12 out of 10. The sheer audacity of the Aika series in general and, in particular, the last three episodes is breathtaking. The producers make no bones about what its purpose is – or maybe they do – and for that you have to admire their gall and the end result.
All in all, I would say that it’s an excellent addition to your collection if you either like extreme anime, want to own the widest possible range of anime fare or are just prepared to accept it for what it truly is; animated soft-core porn. If none of those points apply to you, then skip it.
It’s your choice though. But if you’re new to Aika or anime in general I’d suggest you rent it, watch it alone (unless you really don’t give a damn what others think), and then decide.
