OVA Impressions: Yozakura Quartet – Hoshi no Umi – 01

Please, someone. Confirm that Yozakura Quartet’s OVA is going to be a long one. I mean, seriously: this is way too awesome to just end in three episodes. This was meant to be the real adaptation, faithful to the manga. There is no way that the manga is this small, right? I mean, that Supernatural OVA of Madhouse also has 22 episodes. There is no reason why this shouldn’t be possible for Yozakura Quartet as well, and it’s not like this episode felt rushed in any way. Right?

Let’s start with the animation, which is absolutely fantastic: there are no still frames whatsoever. Most of this episode was build up and slice of life, but even there the animation was consistently fluid and expressive. And then the action-scenes came, at the second half of the episode, and they were even better. If only because of those scenes, this OVA NEEDS to be watched.

As for the story… I really don’t know how the TV-series managed to screw things up this badly. I mean, it’s not like they had a bad director here: it was the director of Red Garden, Kurenai and Rozen Maiden: he really could have pulled this off. Instead, we got a generic shounen series that become boring after just one episode. This episode was much, much better. It knows that its premise around superpowerful teenagers is a bit bland, so it spends most of its time fleshing these people out.

They’re really helped by the animation here, but even there I feel like I’ve gotten a much better picture of the characters than with the TV-series, and in any case they’re a lot more likable now, despite the fact that it introduced another love triangle. It is a bit boring at times, especially when you don’t like teenagers, but it formed a very good base for the final parts of the episode, and the rest of the OVA.

The action was both fun, exciting and brutal. I love how the creators weren’t afraid to insert some humour, turning a bunch of stereotypical bank robbers into a bunch of hilarious scapegoats (something I’ve noticed with very few other anime), and the strong art and animation really did a great job to swap the mood into a much darker atmosphere.
OVA Episode Rating: 8,75/10