City Hunter: Bay City Wars

The nice thing about 'City Hunter,' as a franchise of action and comedy, is that in general one can jump right in here or there and not worry so much about having prior knowledge. Maybe there are tidbits that one would appreciate more given prior experience with the manga or anime, but a standalone feature like 'Bay City wars' is capably written such that one can pick up easily enough on who characters are, their relationships, and so on. Just as much to the point, with the especially abbreviated runtime here, the skills of protagonist Saeba Ryo as a private detective aren't called upon so much as the story heavily emphasizes wild action violence and, to a lesser extent, the expected silly humor; the plot is quite straightforward. On that note, this 1990 release may not be the best representation of Hojo Tsukasa's creation for those otherwise unfamiliar - but it only wants to entertain, and as far a I'm concerned it ably does just that.

Now, when I say that the plot is straightforward, I mean that it wouldn't need to be modified in the slightest to be presented as an episode of a stereotypical "Saturday morning cartoon" like 'G. I. Joe.' Hojo's original story is decent enough, and Hirano Yasushi's subsequent screenplay, but there's little real substance, no nuance, and no finesse. You want action, you've got it; you want comedy, you've got it; you want an earnest, engrossing narrative with meaningful, distinguishable characters, this might not be the place to look. If given license to tell a more expansive tale with a longer runtime I've no doubt we would have seen just that, but this wasn't the place to do so. In fairness, the flick knows exactly what it is, and all involved understood the assignment. So the action is fluid and duly exciting; the bits of comedy are funny; the plot is sufficient. If not the absolute top-notch example, we get all the detail we anticipate of anime, with swell character designs, nice backgrounds and environments, and so on. Does a small film like this truly need anything more?

With commendable voice acting and sound effects, and a solid score to complement the proceedings, 'Bay City wars' is fine just as it is. For as direct and light as this is it's not necessarily fully satisfying, but it's still good and enjoyable. In this case, I don't think its ambitions aimed any higher than that, and they didn't need to. One shouldn't go out of their way for this, and I repeat that there are other pieces of 'City Hunter' that one may be better off exploring first, but if you do come across it, it's a suitably fun way to pass forty-odd minutes.