Bubblegum Crisis
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Bubblegum Crisis is an anime OVA Series that takes at least part of its inspiration from Philip K. Dick's and Ridley Scott's Blade Runner.
Bubblegum Crisis is a mecha style anime that takes place in the future in a post-disaster Tokyo, now known as Megatokyo. The series has a manga adaptation.
The original OVA series was eight episodes long. It was originally slated to run for thirteen episodes, but due to legal problems between the two studios who jointly held the rights to the series, Artmic and Youmex, the series was discontinued. The problems may have been bought on by the series' lacklustre sales in Japan. In North America, however, the series did comparatively well, and has remained a fan favorite.
In Japan, a number of manga were produced that featured characters and storylines based in the BGC (a common abbreviation for the series name) universe. Some were very much thematically linked to the OVA series, others were "one shots" or comedy features. A number of artists participated in the creation of these comics, including Kenichi Sonoda, who had produced the original Knight Saber character designs. A North American comic based in the Bubblegum Crisis Universe was published in English by Dark Horse Comics.
The series involves the adventures of the Knight Sabers, an all woman group of superheroes/mercenaries, who don powered armor and fight various problems, most frequently rogue boomers. Boomers are humanoid robots designed to perform a variety of tasks, from construction and firefighting to combat; a particular model of Boomer, the BU-33S "Sexaroid", is designed for sexual purposes.
One of the central themes of the series, showing its Blade Runner influence strongly, is the exploration of what "human" really means. As in Blade Runner, this is often done by using the mechanical characters, especially focusing on BU-33S.
Bubblegum Crisis was notable also in that it was one of the few early anime series that were brought over from Japan unedited and subtitled with English captions that still have a great deal of popularity today. While anime has become much more popular in the intervening years, in 1991 it was still mostly unknown as a storytelling medium in North America.
In 1997, a new series was created, titled "Bubblegum Crisis 2040", but was not a sequel to the original OVA series. It was a standalone television series, and while it used similar themes to the original, it employed new designs for the characters and the mechanical devices. This series ran for twenty six episodes. Some discussion has taken place between the production companies for a second season, tentatively titled "Bubblegum Crisis 2041".
Despite the age of the original series, a non-Japanese fandom still exists for it (further research is necessary to determine the size of a possible Japanese one), and throughout the years there have been many debates on parts of the series that were unclear or deliberately arranged as to provoke discussion. The community of fans have produced large quantities of "fan fiction" and "fan art" based on both the OVA and television series, though there is a preponderance of works and discussion based on the original series. This is partly due to the longer period of time that it has been out, but it is also partly due to a large portion of the fandom expressing a preference for the original series. It is unclear as to how the proportions of preference will change as further time passes.
Bubblegum Crisis has many features that have proven attractive to many viewers of anime. The mecha designs, character designs and overall concepts are interesting and well-realized. The storylines are varied and complex, and are (sometimes deliberately, sometimes not) filled with parts that have multiple possible interpretations. The series was also one of the earliest anime to have a strong yuri fandom.
Bubblegum Crisis is also a name of a roleplaying game published by R. Talsorian under the Fuzion system.
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Sequels and Spin-Offs
- AD Police Files
- Bubblegum Crash
- Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040
- AD Police: To Serve and Protect
- Bubblegum Crisis: Parasite Dolls
- Holiday in Bali special (live action)
- Hurricane Live 2032 and 2033
- Non-canonical American comic books and a role playing game.
Major Characters
Note: all character information is for the original OVA series. There are some differences in character background for BGC 2040.
Sylia Stingray
An enigmatic billionaire, and the founder of the Knight Sabers. Sylia frequently engages in close combat with boomers. Sylia is the daughter of Dr. Katsuhito Stingray, the man who invented boomers. Several questions about Sylia and her origins are raised in the series, but never answered. Some fans believe that Sylia is a boomer herself, or at least enhanced with boomer technology. The comic by Adam Warren "Bubblegum Crisis: Grand Mal" revolves around Warren's idea that Sylia has an enhanced brain. Suzuki Toshio of Artmic has been quoted as saying that Sylia has an augmented brain, and is said to have approved of Warren's comic.
Original OVA voice actress: Yoshiko Sakakibara.
Nene Romanova
A perky hacker, employed as a dispatcher for the AD Police. She is also a member of the Knight Sabers. Nene does little fighting, focusing on sensor ops, battlefield communications, ECM and ECCM.
From the AIC 15th Anniversary artbook, which includes both artwork and descriptive text, the following information regarding Nene was translated (with conversions from metric to imperial added):
- Height: 1.56 m (5 ft 1 in)
- Weight: 48 kg (105.84 lb)
- Born: 2014-08-31
- Age (Series Start): 18
- Where she's from: Tokyo (the book described this as "conjecture")
- Three Sizes: 80–60–85 cm (31–24–33 in) (these are also the measurements of the voice actress that voiced Nene)
- Blood Type: O Type
- Personality: (English approximation) A little naïve. A big space case and a follower of each new fad.
- Interest/Taste/Hobby: Eating cake after showering
- Special Skill: Computer hacking
- Explanatory Notes: Nene oversees the gathering and analysis of the Knight Saber's Military Intelligence.
These are not the only stats regarding Nene. The ones derived from the BGC crash game, "Crime Wave", state the following:
- DoB: August 31, 2014
- Height: 1.56 m (5 ft 1 in)
- Weight: 42 kg
- Chest: 84 cm (33 in)
- Waist: 58 cm (23 in)
- Hips: 86 cm (34 in)
Nene was rated, in the 15th Annivesary book, as the second best in the top ten list of favorite AIC female characters. Catty from Gall Force took the top spot.
Original OVA voice actress: Hiramatsu Akiko
Linna Yamazaki
Works various jobs including aerobics instructor, Linna once hoped to pursue a career in professional dancing. She is a member of the Knight Sabers, focusing on combat. Compared to the other major characters, Linna got very little character development in the original series. However in BGC 2040 Linna was perhaps the most developed character.
Original OVA voice actress: Tomizawa Michie
Priscilla S. Asagiri
Priss, as she is most often called, is a rather angry, violent person. She is a member of the Knight Sabers, specializing in close combat. She is the lead singer in the rock band "Priss and the Replicants", a reference to the movie Blade Runner.
Priss' voice actress in the original OVA is, in real life, a singer in the rock band which did the music for Bubblegum Crisis.
Original OVA voice actress: Oomori Kinuko
Leon McNichol
AD Police officer. Leon is a dedicated cop, with a tendency to rush in without thinking. He is a skilled powered armor pilot, one of the AD Police force's aces in its K-11 and K-12S powered suits. He has a crush on Priss, which she does not like since she has reasons to despise the AD Police. As the series progresses he discovers that she is a Knight Saber, but does nothing with that knowledge. Priss and Leon's relationship grows closer during the series, and in a side story audio drama, she confesses that she loves him.
Original OVA voice actor: Toshio Furukawa
Daley Wong
AD Police officer. Daley is Leon's partner, and a highly skilled investigator. Daley is also openly homosexual, which is worth noting because at the time the original OVA was produced male homosexual characters were quite rare in anime. Also notable is the ease and comfort of Daley and Leon's working relationship: Daley flirts openly with the heterosexual Leon, and Leon often reciprocates with good humor. Daley is not developed much in the series.
Original OVA voice actor: Kenyuu Horiuchi
Brian J Mason/Largo
Executive in Genom. The primary villain of the first three episodes, Mason is the man who killed Dr. Stingray and stole his boomer technology. As with Sylia, certain mysteries are created around Mason which are never resolved in the series. It is generally accepted that Mason somehow transferred his personality into a boomer body some time prior to his death. Most likely he succeded in transfering his memories in the ultimate boomer, thus creating a God-like being (as you'd call one person able to blast down 8 Genom major branch in a single instant) with the mind and the dreams of a man. Largo resurfaces to become the primary villain of episodes 5 and 6.
See "The Mason/Largo Theory" at http://www.ravensgarage.com/garage/maslargo.htm for more details on how Mason may have transferred his consciousness to Largo.
Original OVA voice actor: Shuuichi Ikeda. Largo: Kazuyuki Sogabe
Crew
The original character designs were done by Kenichi Sonoda, a manga artist most known for his Gunsmith Cats series. He was selected after Amano Yoshitaka declined to participate in the development of the series.
Directors: Katsuhito Akiyama, and Hiroaki Goda.
(see also Knight Sabers, AD Police, Boomer, Genom, Megatokyo)
External links
- Another Bubblegum Crisis FAQ (http://robkelk.ottawa-anime.org/bgc-faq.html)
- The newsgroup alt.fan.bgcrisis (news:alt.fan.bgcrisis)
- The newsgroup alt.fan.bgcrisis via Google Groups (http://groups.google.com/groups?safe=images&ie=ISO-8859-1&as_ugroup=alt.fan.bgcrisis&lr=&hl=en)
Categories: Anime | Manga