Burn Up W Review

story 3.5/10

Burn Up W takes place in Tokyo, and revolves around a group of girls who make up Warrior, an undercover police force that takes the cases the normal cops can't handle. Unlike some cop shows that focus on different stories, Burn Up W focuses on one arc that involves terrorists who want to do various nefarious things.

After seeing Burn Up (and enjoying it), I was excited to check out the next thing chronologically, Burn Up W. Needless to say I was very disappointed, and hopefully by the end of reading this you'll know why. Let's start with the type of show this is. Burn Up was a very action filled police romp that involved danger, suspense, and lots of guns. Though there was some fanservice, it wasn't overflowing, and even someone like me who hates fanservice didn't mind. In general it was very entertaining -- something that Burn Up W was not. Instead of sticking with the entertaining action filled police drama, Burn Up W decided to go a different route and turn itself into 100% fanservice (with some action thrown in for good measure). I'm talking super fanservice complete with plentiful jiggling breasts that fill out a uniform way too tightly, ass shots whenever possible, panty shots, and other such things. Riiiight. Again, it's much different than the previous Burn Up, and I didn't find that to be a good thing.

There is a decent amount of comedy, but all of it is related to sex or fanservice in some way (unfortunately). There's so much fanservice that the plot itself really falls by the wayside and ends up being totally uninteresting. Terrorists threatening the world? Who cares, there's another ass in your face! Characters that might actually have some sort of depth? Don't worry, we'll just show them in a skimpy uniform trying to sell their used underwear for money!

I'll admit it's hard for me to rate shows that end up being almost entirely fanservice-based, but I still have to rate this section low. I didn't see much point to this OVA. There wasn't a good plot, too much fanservice, characters that we end up not caring about (including when one of them dies, which should be sad, right?), and overall it just wasn't entertaining in my eyes. The first episode was definitely the best, but gradually plummeted downhill and got to a point where I was very distracted by the simplest things (perhaps my brain's attempt to get me to stop watching it). Overall, a poor story in my opinion.

animation 7/10

If you are looking for something with 90s style animation, look no further. Colors were vibrant and crisp, with plenty of reds and blues. Character designs were decent, but unappealing in my eyes, with pointy hair, boring uniforms and huge eyes. Oh, and did I mention the ridiculously large (and often exposed) breasts? These things looked like they would pop out of the uniforms at any moment. The shirts must have been XL because damn they were stretched tight! Again, it was a distraction from the story, and that's not a good thing. Near the end, the colors and animation in general got a bit weird (with strange color highlights and somewhat odd jerkiness with action scenes). Overall, the animation was probably my favorite part of the OVA, if that says anything.

sound 4/10

Music was totally unforgettable, except the fact that you remember it was made out of synths and sounds very early 90s. I can't say much else about it because it was so uninteresting that I forgot what it sounded like, except the bits I mentioned above.

Voice acting, on the other hand, I remember... but not in a positive way. Burn Up W suffers from annoying-whiny-Japanese-girl syndrome, where all the female characters sound so nasal and whiny that you want to punch them all in the face.

characters 3.5/10

Well, there definitely are a plethora of characters, but I can't say I was excited about any of them. Rio is definitely the main character, and she is constantly worrying about money (so much that she tries to sell her underwear for some extra cash). She's constantly doing various slutty things like coming on to her boss to get a day off, or manipulating her male co-worker so he'll do anything for her. Vile woman behavior at its finest (and I'm a woman, mind you). The rest of the teammates are utterly forgettable, with the exception of the trigger happy one. Then again, I still don't remember even her name, so that says something, right?

Yuji plays the part of the hormone-laden male who falls over backwards to do anything for Rio, and I didn't find him terribly amusing. The terrorists and bad guys were uninspiring and boring. In general, I found myself completely unattached to everyone in the series, even when someone important died.

overall 3.8/10

Overall, I was very disappointed with Burn Up W. I was expecting something entertaining and fun in the vein of the original Burn Up, but instead got a fanservice saturated romp that had little comedy, an uninspiring plot, and characters that didn't matter in the long run. If anything, I'd suggest you watch the original Burn Up over this. Else, I guess you'd enjoy this if you really like fanservice. Otherwise, not worth your time. Then again, I don't see any merit to this even for fanservice lovers, so you'd need to choose for yourself.