fficially, Kei and Yuri are code-named the Lovely Angels. Off the record, most people look at their violent track record and refer to them as the Dirty Pair. They're both marginally qualified members of the galaxy's famous 3WA (World Welfare & Works Agency), physically skilled but none too bright, with a penchant for accidentally destroying whatever they're assigned to protect.
The Dirty Pair are a classic part of anime history in various guises, and they're back in a new form in A.D.V.'s newest videotape series. The serial begins in "Runaway Angel," as a badly wounded man presents Yuri with a computer card and a frantic command to get it to the 3WA. He promptly drops dead. Before Yuri's even stopped sniveling, she's being attacked by his killers, who want the card back. As is typical, the Dirty Pair accidentally drag half the city into the subsequent massive chase and even more massive pitched battle for possession of the mysterious card.
In episode No. 2, "Darkside Angel," Kei becomes obsessed with a famous assassin after two officials in her charge are murdered in the middle of a supposedly secure spaceport. Shrugging off Yuri's alternating pleas and insults, Kei repeatedly disobeys 3WA orders to continue her pursuit of a woman who's supposedly already captured or dead. Her instincts about the assassin prove correct, but her skills aren't nearly good enough to bring the woman in--although they do prove capable of destroying an army that gets in the way.
Dirty Pair meets Sailor Moon
Dirty Pair fans who have seen earlier manga or anime adaptations of the dangerous duo aren't likely to even recognize this new incarnation of anime's toughest team. The girls have a new look, and not a particularly flattering one. Their giant eyes, shortened limbs and froufrou hair make them look like extras from Sailor Moon. The voices aren't as hideous as they were in Streamline Pictures' Dirty Pair dubs, but they're still pretty irritating; Kei speaks primarily in shrieks, Yuri alternately in shrieks and whines.
More disturbingly, they spend so much time screaming at each other that they accomplish virtually nothing in these two episodes. To a point their rivalry is comic, but it rapidly becomes tiresome and redundant. As does much of the rest of the simpleminded, repetitive action. After the 10th explosion, the 11th shot of Kei's bouncing, nearly-exposed breasts, and the 12th screeched insult, viewers may instinctively want to channel surf. It doesn't help that neither episode reaches anything resembling a satisfying conclusion; the motivating factors and groups behind episode No. 1 are never explained, and No. 2 simply peters out into an ongoing story.
Kei and Yuri have always been memorable figures with both comic and dramatic flair, competitors as well as partners. But this frantic, inchoate opener takes every interesting aspect of the duo's characters to ridiculous, hyperbolic heights, rendering the humor imbecilic, the drama unbelievable and the Lovely Angels' physical proportions beyond unreal. Future installments may wrap up the plot holes, but unless the series' tone changes considerably, it'll be difficult to care.
