Counting Out Kentoushi

I’m amused by the degree of satiric, hyperbolic offense that YouTube anime critic Kenny Lauderdale felt about the 1990 OVA Kentoushi.

In an ironic way, I’m somewhat grateful that his review video reminded me that this anime exists. I watched it back in June 2016. This is what I thought of it at the time:

The first episode of the 1990 OVA Kentoushi may be one of the singular worst anime I’ve ever seen. The story isn’t especially bad; it’s merely mundane. A Japanese street fighter immigrates to New York City hoping to transition into a professional boxer. In many respects the OVA looks and feels like a more conventional prototype to the exceedingly similar anime film Heavy that was released only three months later. Some details of the first Kentoushi OVA are a bit silly. Protagonist Kenji rescuing a girl being chased by a gang of thugs is a narrative cliché. But him doing so twice in the same 45 minute OVA pushes credibility into incredulity. Scenery shots of New York are typically either sepia-filtered photographs or laughable hand-drawn backgrounds that depict 1980’s New York City as a virtual apocalyptic ruin. Despite Kenji finally finding a gym that will accept him, he never seems to have a trainer. He just spends interminable amounts of time working the bag, exemplifying the OVA’s biggest weakness. This OVA isn’t a motion comic, but it would be more excusable if it was. The animation quality rivals vintage Knack productions. It makes 60’s anime like Tiger Mask seem well-animated by comparison. I estimate that more than half of the episode consists of recycled frames of animation. Frame rates are appalling low and occasionally frames are simply missing, causing body parts to just vanish. Continuity is inconsistent. In one shot Kenji is wearing boxing gloves. Then in the next shot he’s not. Then in the following shot the gloves are back. In one scene a character simply materializes because the OVA doesn’t bother to animate him entering the room. The fight referee seems to count to 12 or more instead of doing a ten-count because his arm motions are just arbitrarily repeated frames. Periodically through the episode even sound effects are mistimed. Particularly during the climactic sparring match, some of Kenji’s punches seem to be magical delayed-reaction punches because the sound effects are late. What should be an involving and exciting OVA is rendered laughable and tremendously boring because viewers get real tired of seeing the same shots repeated ad nauseam.