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Moldiver is a tongue in cheek parody of the superhero genre. Hiroshi
invents a sort of energy field which makes the wearer invulnerable,
and can be programmed to look like how the wearer wishes to appear
(in Hiroshi’s case as a musclebound superhero). He then
runs around saving people and catching criminals on his day off.
Unfortunately his younger sister Mirai gets hold of the device and
uses it herself, reprogramming its appearance in the process. One
of the classic moments in this is when Hiroshi uses the unit just
after Mirai has reprogrammed it... The villain of the piece is Dr
Amagi, an obsessed individual who collects old technologies such as
racing cars, videos etc, by fair means or foul. To help him he
has six female androids – the Machine Gals (all apparently based
on real movie stars, but I couldn’t identify a couple).
The first couple of tapes are quite jolly, the villain tries to swipe
a racing car, the space shuttle and the battleship Yamato (?). Hiroshi
and Mirai in their various guises put paid to these naughty deeds
more by accident than design. Any series that features a plot
where an idol singer is strapped to a space shuttle and launched is
OK in my book...
However, the last tape has a darker edge to it, and unfortunately
it doesn't work. The problem with these two episodes is that little
happens, and what action there is is dragged out to the point of tedium.
When I bought the first two tapes, I was told that the last two episodes
hadn't even been made yet, and I'll bet the production team were under
a lot of pressure to come up with the goods they certainly have the
feeling of a rush job.
The designs are very well done and the settings have a nice sort of
utopian feel to them. The characters are all nicely turned out, and
the animation is well done. The dub is OK, even if Mirai is a little
high pitched for my liking.
The first two tapes: 8/10 good mindless fun. The third tape 2/10 turgid
tosh. Avoid.
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Possibly the ultimate Macross incarnation, it certainly comes across
as the most mature take on the series available in the UK, and to
top it all off Manga Entertainment have released a box set!