Venus Project sure as hell ain't my kind of show. But I was curious about it anyway because the publicity pictures seemed to suggest it might be a good source of cheesecake for the top rotation, come the day.

So the first episode came by on the raws and I downloaded it. It was 1 GB for 24 minutes, which should have been a tipoff that something was wrong.

The first episode was almost entirely live action. And apparently it's going to alternate animated episodes with live-action episodes, 6 and 6. The first episode did have a few samples of animation -- and if they're typical, it's going to be some of the worst animation we've ever seen. It looked like it was only about 3 frames per second, and the art was very plain.

Venus Project part of an attempt to create a multimedia franchise, with games, mangas, and a pile of other stuff. The TV series is the hook that's supposed to pull everyone into buying all the other things.

The basic story is about three girls who, in the anime, wear skimpy skin-tight clothing and are trying to break into becoming seiyuu. And the live action focuses on the three actual seiyuu who voice them, and who are all newbies. Art imitates life; these three really are using this show to break in.

In the anime the three girls are also trying to become idols. I have no idea whether that's also going to be part of the live action, but if it is, it's hopeless. Frankly, the women are not very good looking. (There were six, but I think three of them only appear in the game.)

For voice actresses that doesn't matter. A lot of my favorite voice actresses are rather plain looking. But if you're genuinely trying to be an idol, part of that is being beautiful -- and they aren't.

It pains me to say this, in some ways, because some of my favorite voices are supporting roles: Takehito Koyasu, Romi Park, Ami Koshimizu. That's good stuff.

But the rest is utter crap. The set they're using for the live action, for instance, is totally tacky. "Go find us a boxing ring we can rent for cheap for an afternoon." and someone did.

I will be astounded if anyone subs the live action part of this series, and rather surprised if anyone does any of it at all.

I've heard that there are people who like Idol shows, but I can't imagine that even those folks could like this one. I think we have an early candidate for "worst show of 2015" here.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in General Anime at 07:44 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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