Battle Girls: Time Paradox

ThatAnimeSnob Apr 12, 2012

5

This anime is based on a pachinko game (something between a slot machine and a flipper). Said game also has a story. A Japanese schoolgirl magically transfers back in time to the period of Japan’s unification. She takes part in the war by befriending one of the major generals and goes to … find a magic armour. I guess unifying Japan with this premise is impossible without a McGuffin to help you. The catch is, everybody in this world is a skimpy clothed young girl. Not even a man in sight! In fact the only male character in the whole show is a talking dog. So imagine the Sengoku era, one of the bloodiest times in Japanese history, to have been turned to a magical place full of half naked lesbians looking for a magic item… and the whole thing is actually the backdrop story of a game of balls… Only thing, nobody actually has “balls” besides a talking dog… And it is not a hentai; I repeat, not a hentai. Confused? So was I for a couple of hours. Sure, anime never tried to be historical and the era was always twisted around to look as far fetched as possible. The most famous example is the anime Sengoku Basara, where all the characters are bishonens with superpowers and the whole war was nothing but a videogame with lots of macho talking and no actual field tactics. I never liked that show but it was nice brainless entertainment for most. This anime is the same but in girls-only version. Did it work equally the same? Well, for starters WHAT’S GOING ON WITH THE PREMISE? Why is everybody female? Why is everybody half-naked? Oh, I am sure that in a fan pleasing way all that can be simply excused as pure guilty pleasure but in terms of internal consistency the show is simply ridiculous. Sengoku Basara could claim to be about the guys fighting while the girls are safe in the kitchen as always. That old retro title Gall Force excused nicely how there are only women because they just clone themselves. Battle Girls have no valid excuse (other than silly magic). How the heck do they breed? XDThe directing is done by Okamoto Hideki, someone who has nothing but bellow average ecchi and harems in his roster. So sounds like he is right at home with this brainless fan catering title. The production values are not bad either, since most of the time you get interesting sceneries with nice colouring. But don’t get too excited since Studio TMS never produced an above average work (its best attempts were Hundred Stories, Kenichi, and D.Gray-Man). The characters are all drawn generic but chances are you will only care about how much skin they show, at which point I say it was ok and their costumes lovably kitsch in a videogame fashion. There are of course countless anachronisms in the way everything works but it’s not like the show tries to be historically accurate; so don’t mind that. Voice acting ain’t bad and in times of tension they could still sound scared and sad despite the ridiculous roles they began with. In terms of characters, they all don’t have much of a presence, other than showing bare skin and lesbo tendencies but when the story wants to get darker, they do manage to feel a bit dramatic. Noting amazing, since they are all very simplistic as personalities and their development is sort of expected to be as such but definitely not cardboards. Of course, given the nature of the show to the most part they are just goofing around but let’s not get into that because it never attempted to be too serious. You basically get a plot where they meet, a sort of romantic triangle forms, and betrayal rises out of jealousy and ambition. Basic stuff but it works and the ending feels satisfactory with what the producers had to work with. I mean, just the fact they bothered to have some plot and character development in such a show sounds like a miracle. Although the anime is just silly fan service fest, it is definitely better than most similar ones thanks to developing past its initial premise and ending in a solid way. Although still immature and brainless all the way, at least it tried to be something more than just aimless softporn. It is still far from a great show and will most likely be forgotten fast, but it is definitely a show anyone can watch between better anime without feeling completely cheated afterwards.

WeaponX06 Feb 17, 2023

3.8

This anime is, as of the time I'm writing this review, the worst I have ever seen. The characters and the story are ridiculously bland and amazingly boring, and the animation and sound is only alright. I didn't exactly expect anything from it going in, but I was still disappointed, and this is the only anime I will say is 100% garbage.

Swampertzone Jul 15, 2016

4

Battle Girls: Time Paradox is one of those anime that you would think it would be a fun and action packed adventure in old Japan however its not. The anime is just not fun to watch. The first episode was the only epsiode that I was interested it and everything else was either boring, stupid, uninteresting, or even to fast for its own good. What do I mean? The anime is only 13 episodes and they don't have anything interesting or funny to keep me ingauged. Story The story is bad and not interesting for me to care. It had so much potential because it could have been longer than 13 episodes. If the anime was longer it could have been a little more interesting, but not much. The main premise is that Nobunaga, who is a girl and everyone else is a girl, wants the red crimson armor so she can rule over Ancient Japan, and a girl named Hideyoshi who is sent back into a "Time Paradox" ;) ;) to help her on her quest. That's it and it's done really quick and the main villan is the pink haired girl whose name I can't remember and in the end Nobunaga can rule Ancient Japan without the armor because she defeats the pink haired girl with the other "Battle Girls". Ugh I really had a rough time with this story and the worst part of this is that this has ecchi elements in it. What do I mean? There are only a few episodes where the some of the girls are in the bath and there chest region is showing which made me realize yep this is an ecchi, and a bad one at that. Animation The animation is ok at best. The charaters are drawn pretty well and the charaters movements are ok. The backgrounds and buildings are pretty good. It what Feudal Japan would have looked like. The one thing I would say is that I did like the fact that the "Time Paradox" that we are in has nothing but girls witch is a bit off putting to me. Not much else to say about the animation. Sound I don't have too much to say about the sound so I'll try to be brief about it. The opening is ok but after hearing it in the beginning of the episode a lot it got old and I didn't care anymore and I'm never a fan of ending so I never care about the ending song. The voice actresses were fine an all but there were only two voice actresses that I recoginze from this anime and they did an okay job. They are Brittany Karbaowski playing Hideyoshi and Hillary Haag playing the Pink haired girl, but everyone i could remember or recognize and yes I watched the English Dub of this so don't judge me. Characters Oh Boy where do I even begin? I know, the characters are boring, not interesting, and not memorable in the slightest with the exception of Hideyoshi and Nobunaga. None of the charaters had a lasting impression or intreresting trait about them. I can't even remember some if not all of the charaters names. Hate these characters and they are not memorable at all. Overall this anime is not good. Sure there were something that got me interested like the first episode but after that it went all down hill from there. Do not watch Battle Girls Time Paradox it is not worth the effort to watch it. I can guarantee there are other anime that are much better than this and do you want to know who licensed this anime Sentai Filmworks. Sentai Filmworks has its fair share of bad and good anime and this one is on the list of bad. I don't recommend this anime to anyone because you will be bored and questioning to yourself why did i watch this.