Thursday, 21 October 2010

Star Driver - Episode 3

If there's one thing I can say about Star Driver from its opening two episodes, it's that it barely makes the tiniest bit of sense.  Yet still I persevere, doubtless frying my brain a little more each week in the process.


This third instalment of the series introduces us a little more comprehensively to "high school wife" Watanabe, a woman married to a much older man who is only interested in her for one thing, although on the plus side he is also filthy rich, to the point where he can happily give his new wife a hulking great nice boat as a present.  Watanabe's acquired wealth also proves to be a potential boon for Takuto, who is suffering having lost all his money during his swim to the island - something that he can redress when Watanabe asks if he wants to clean her swimming pool (that isn't a euphemism for something by the way... I think) to earn some cash.

So Takuto and his friends (including the cute vice president) head on over to clean this pool, which just so happens to be the home to an alligator... or was it a crocodile?  Oh, who cares, it makes no difference, as the whole thing is really just a clumsy and rather dull set-up to bring us to the real deal, involving Takuto fighting his next opponent first in the "real world" (where neither party puts in much effort) before transferring their rivalry to the crazy world of Cybodies as the Glittering Crux Brigade continue to look for a way to defeat Tauburn to advance their plans.

Well, we're now three episodes in, and Star Driver remains little more than a pile of nonsense that doesn't know what it wants to be in terms of its plot.  One minute it's a high school comedy, the next its some kind of harem show, then it's a drama of sorts before we move to the week's admittedly impressive action scenes where we get to watch some big robots fighting... now with added swords!  I keep telling myself that there's something big, clever and more intricate in terms of the show's story just around the corner but I'm beginning to wonder - Star Driver is increasingly looking like some kind of "robot fight of the week" anime with little else to say for itself to the point of being wilfully obtuse.  Right now it's only those admittedly wonderfully animated action scenes that are holding my attention in the midst of all the fluff - I care not for either any of the characters or the scenario they have been placed within, and that's going to need to change pretty sharpish for this show to really hold my interest to any notable degree.

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