Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering an OVA from 1989. That OVA is "Riding Bean".
Now I heard about "Riding Bean" a few years ago, back when I was still looking up movies to cover for this series. And I was always curious about this one simply because it's another OVA that I've never heard of until I discovered it on YouTube right out of the blue. But for one reason or another, I just kept pushing it back simply because I had other movies eventually lined up on the schedule until I almost completely forgot about it, at least until last week when I was on vacation. And since I had just gotten back from my vacation not too long ago, I figured something short would be perfect for tonight. And in case you're wondering, this thing is only 45 minutes long, so I think I deserve a little bit of a break with this one.
Now outside of this being a rather short OVA, I don't really know much about the plot to this one. I think the main character is a detective of sorts and he's joined by his female detective friend. I don't really know if that's at all accurate, but I'll eventually find out once I start watching it. So I may as well just forgo all of the bullshit and just jump right into this one here and see if it's any good. And the only way I'm gonna know if it's any good or not is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Riding Bean".
1 minute later
OK, well, I can say this much, so far. This song here is pretty good. It sorta has that late 80's vibe to it that I kinda dig. So, at least that's one positive so far.
5 minutes later
All right, guys, um...I got two things I need to bring up here. One, the dub here is terrible. Which, I can normally handle that sort of thing...except, I'm also just noticing the dialogue isn't entirely matching with the mouth movements of the characters. Last time I had that kind of issue was when I watched "The Girl In The Shell". And that's not a good thing, considering how awful that dub was. This one I'm hoping is just a technical issue with the version I'm watching on YouTube. But still, I may end up having to deal with this sort of dub for the next half hour or so. This might end up sucking, guys.
4 minutes later
OK...well, the client who just met with Bean is now dead. So...I guess the job is off, maybe...? Then again, considering Bean and Rally are under fire at the moment with a little girl, I'm guessing that they might be forced to accept the job now whether they get paid or not. At least, that's what I'm going to assume, anyways.
2 minutes later
So, guys, looks like I was wrong. The guy who got "shot" earlier is not actually dead. And it's actually a woman, who we also saw earlier disguised as another dude. Are they gonna explain who the fuck this woman is? Because I've seen her twice already and her motivations, so far, aren't really making any sense. I'm hoping they will later on. But as of right now, I'm just kinda left with more questions than answers.
4 minutes later
You know, guys, I can see that there's suppose to be an act of abuse, followed by, uh...weird relationship that the short pink haired girl and woman share, that I'm suppose to take seriously, however, I can't, what with the dub being just laughably terrible. No seriously, guys, the acting in this dub has gotten worse...and yet, somehow, I'm actually kinda looking forward to seeing how much more stupid this dub can be. I'm actually sorta surprised by this one, guys. I wasn't really expecting that.
6 minutes later
Well, guys, this OVA teaches you a very valuable lesson: *Never* call Bean's car a piece of shit. Otherwise, he will run over you in a rather creative way. So yeah, that's a lesson well worth learning.
7 minutes later
Once more, guys, I must reiterate that the music in this OVA is seriously really good. I know you guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but I'm really digging the music in this OVA. It's really that good.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Riding Bean". And, uh...let me go ahead and shut this thing off here...my god. Where the fuck do I even start with this thing?! Well, I suppose I can give you my summarized thoughts. Is this thing good? Uh...no. I'm no way gonna say that this OVA is actually good. Now is this thing so bad it's good? Oh, most certainly guys. This is one of the most laughably bad OVA's I've seen in a long time. Which is saying a lot, considering all the shit I had to sit through for this series. But this is definitely on a level of being so bad it's good. In fact, I would say it's so bad, it's funny as hell. It's really sort of a unique kind of OVA I'm dealing with here, guys.
I may as well just start with the writing, which that's gonna be a challenge in of itself because the story here makes no sense at all. The best I could pick up from this mess is that our heroes, Bean Bandit and Rally, end up taking a job from some guy, who's disguised as our villain of the OVA and end up kidnapping some president's daughter for ransom. And somehow, they're able to frame Bean for the kidnapping, which causes the police, along with Inspector Percy to go after him for his arrest. I'll talk more about Percy in a moment, but as for the story itself, like I said, it really doesn't make any sense and you're bound to ask questions the more that it continues to not make any sense of itself. I really believe that this thing could be best viewed as a mindless popcorn flick. Where if you shut off your brain and you don't think about any of the potential issues this OVA has with it's writing, then you're bound to enjoy this thing immensely. Which, even then, it's still in the realms of it being a plotless action film anyways, and almost no one's going to care about the plot, so this will be perfect for anyone who's into that sort of thing.
Now let's talk about the characters. Almost every character in this OVA is bland as shit, with the one lone exception being our main character Bean Bandit. Essentially, guys, Bean is something of a private mercenary of sorts and he's the only one who has something of a personality that helps carries this whole thing. If that wasn't the case, then this entire OVA would've been unwatchable for it's entire 45 minute runtime. Because almost every other character is either bland as shit, or they're just completely over the top and goofy. In the former, it's mainly just Rally and Chelsea, the little girl that Bean and Rally are trying to escort back home. Rally is Bean's assistant and she has no actual personality to her character. Chelsea is also the same way, and also doesn't sound anything like an 11 year old girl would naturally sound like. However, I'll get into all that later when I cover the acting for this dub.
And as for characters who are completely over the top, we have our villain, who's named Semmerling, and I asked earlier if they were gonna explain anything about who she was, and, well, outside of her name, she sounds almost cartoonishly evil and she somehow was able to survive a gunshot wound to the head thanks to her disguise, as if she's some third rate knock off of Lupin the 3rd. Speaking of which, Inspector Percy, the guy who's after Bean, is basically just Detective Zenigata if Zenigata shouted almost every one of his lines when he was on screen. I'm serious, guys, Percy in this OVA is just completely over the top and he's trying *way* too hard to be charismatic, except he's really just annoying for most of this OVA. Thankfully though, he's not in it all that much, so the pain of him being on screen is limited to an extent. So it's something that you just have to take for what it's worth.
But basically, guys, like I already said, the writing in this thing makes no sense. Perhaps maybe if I ever end up watching this thing again, maybe I'll make some sense out of it's confusing plot. But as for a first going, it doesn't make any sense and it's better to view it as a plotless action film more than anything else. Now as for the dub in this OVA...oh my god, where do I even start with this dub? Well, I did say earlier that this dub was terrible. And yeah, it totally is terrible. Either half of the cast is either just giving out the most wooden performances ever, or they're just overacting to try and sound as hamfisted as possible. In the case of the former, the highest "honor", if you will, goes to Bean, because he sounds like Johnny Bravo on down syndromes. I swear to god that's what he sounds like for the entire OVA. Which, despite that, is more than what I could say about Rally's voice, because it sounds like her voice actress was just reading off her script while putting no effort in at the same time. It sounds horrible...and yet, I actually do kinda like it in it's own stupid way. Because I don't think *any* of these actors have ever acted a day in their lives. I could be wrong on that, but considering that the English voice actors don't have anything in their wiki files, I'm willing to bet this was the only thing they ever did and, well, I guess this dub speaks for itself on how laughably bad it is.
So yeah, the dub in this OVA is far from good, but it's the kind of dub that I'm willing to say is worth watching, especially if you're in the mood for a good laugh, because this dub will provide all that on how laughably terrible it is. And I also should mention something I briefly talked about way early on, which is the mis-timing of the dialogue not matching the mouth movements of the characters. While that is a thing that happens in this OVA, it's not as overly noticeable as it was in "The Girl In The Shell". And the reason why I say that is because in that OVA, nearly the entire dub for that thing had that problem of the dialogue not even trying to match the mouth flaps of the characters whenever they're talking. And as for "Riding Bean", while it's still noticeable, it's not as terrible as it could be here, except for one moment near the end where Bean's voice actor is talking, and, despite him saying a lot of lines in one sentence, his mouth only moves about four times while he's talking and it looked *really* fucking terrible, almost as if no one even cared at that point to properly finish the dub after they recorded the lines. But I'm just speculating at this point. Long story short, the dub here is terrible, but terrible in a so bad, it's good kind of way. So, I'm gonna give the dub here a pass, even though I know it won't be everyone's cup of tea.
Now, setting aside the very questionable dub, I will say that the animation here is really good for the standards of 1989. In fact, I would even say that it still looks really good even today. Granted, some of the character designs could be seen as slightly questionable, such as Bean's massive chin, which definitely does look weird. But at the same time, at least it helps him stand out in his own way. Everyone else, in terms of character design, looks fine the way it is. The art-style is really good, and the color palettes are also utilized very well, too. So yeah, guys, for the most part, the animation and art-style here is very good.
Sound-mixing here is also good. The music here is fantastic. A lot of it resembles that late 80's rock music I love so much. Just about every track here is filled with that 80's cheese that oozes out a lot of charm to this OVA. And I should mention that they apparently did release a CD for this OVA, and I may be tempted to see if that CD is still available online somewhere for a good price. If not, then I'll probably have to look for it on YouTube, which is the more likely option. But still, if you guys get a chance, look up the soundtrack somewhere and give it a listen to. It really is that good.
So ultimately, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Riding Bean"? Honestly, yes, so long as you're someone who's into dubs that are just so laughably bad that they're fun to watch. If you go into it with that mentality, then you're bound to really enjoy it. And also, the OVA's really short, too. It's only 45 minutes long, so if you have that amount of time to spare, go look it up on YouTube. It should still be up there, at least at the time that I'm uploading this review anyways. And if you liked it enough, try and look for it on DVD or Blu-ray somewhere, as long as it's for cheap anyway. I'd say within the realm of below $10 or so. Anything higher than that I would probably not advise. But it is ultimately up to you. For myself, personally speaking, I really enjoyed this thing. I'm not totally sure if it's worth picking up a copy for myself, but if I find it somewhere for cheap, I'll definitely pick it up and add it to my DVD collection. Speaking of which, I'm gonna go and watch something else. Perhaps I'll just watch another action movie of some kind. Maybe something like "Independence Day". Why not? I'm gonna go and watch that next as soon as I get this review uploaded.
And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
