Megami Paradise

Although this show would be rated 18+ by American standards, the only fingering action you'll see here is that of the musical variety.

I'm trying my hardest to recollect, but I can't quite place where I originally heard of this anime. I suspect it happened around the time I first bought a new computer and a home internet connection with my own money from my first job (circa 2004), thus gaining access to the wild and untamed highway of infinite forbidden knowledge. As an avid user of file-sharing programs of the day such as Limewire, Ares, and eMule, I can remember surreptitiously typing in various naughty words just to see what kind of video files would come up, and probably encountered this OVA in the file search after I learned some permutation of the word "hentai".

Or maybe I found it on some ANN or MAL list a bit later? Eh, it was like 20 years ago now, who the hell knows anymore.

This scene would go so hard with a frenetic drum 'n bass line underneath it.

Anyway, Megami Paradise is a quick blink-and-you-miss-it fantasy OVA from 1995 that supposedly functions as a companion piece to a game of the same name released for the PC Engine (fellow American millennials and Gen X-ers may know it better as the "Turbografx-16"). And although the OVA is regularly filed under "hentai" - featuring miniskirts and thongs and splayed leg poses by the truckload, thanks in no small part to having the director for Project A-Ko and Agent Aika onboard - this has to be one of the lightest and least offensive fanservice anime on the planet.

At its core, this little mini-movie encompasses the classic 90s JRPG experience through and through. Four heroes track down a villain who stole a crystal and save the world from plunging into darkness? It's as simple as that, really! I've basically spoiled the entire plot, which more or less comprises the first and final chapters of any bog standard Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy derivative of its day. Since the anime only has two episodes to work with, it cuts out all the actual story meat from the middle, and functionally forms a sort of "extended pilot" for a series that unfortunately never caught on.

I am glad this anime doesn't feature characters shouting the name of their attacks. It's not a deal-breaker for me, but it's something I think works better in small doses.

For what it is though, Megami Paradise could have made for an interesting series with its own identity. Although it very much resembles that familiar "retro anime" style from the 90s that people are currently extremely gaga nostalgic for, the show's aesthetic seems to take heavy inspiration from ballet and classical music. The cast is 100% female (or at the very least femme-androgynous), and often find themselves in exaggerated dance-like poses, putting those impressively long shoujo anime legs to work.

In that regard, that may be exactly why this series is so lightweight as a so-called 18+ production. There are no sex scenes, no more than two or three brief glimpses of titty, and the rest of the "objectionable" material - if you can even call it that - is the same kind of flashy leotard-covered crotch shots you'd see any time a ballerina or figure skater does a high kick. Hell, if it weren't for the scene of one villain catching the heroes in a trap and cracking goofy BDSM jokes, the show would *almost* be acceptable for primetime television!

Listen, you already had me at Swan Lake because ballet is actually pretty fuckin' cool, but Swan Lake With Knives sounds AMAZING.

The other thing the show has going for it that its fellow RPG peers don't is a lot of harp and lyre action. Not only does it visually harken toward that variety of classical European art, MIDI-fied plucked strings are appropriately featured throughout the soundtrack as well. However, true to form for any given anime, they're also used in hilariously campy ways for combat purposes, like one standout scene of a lyre transforming into a bow, or the enemy plucking a string to launch a zombification spell. Personally, I think the harp is an under-appreciated instrument in the musical canon (especially seeing what some people have done with them over the years), so it's cool to see them so nicely featured here.

Beyond that though, the music is a bit silly and all over the place, relying on heavy synth bass samples and choir voices with occasional classical accents. At one point during the final battle I genuinely thought for a moment it was going to break into a full Sabre Dance sequence, and while I doubt it was intended to be comedic, it sure put a smile on my face. Nonetheless, it's fully serviceable as a 90s production, and that style of soundtrack these days represents a treasured time capsule of that era, so I do say all that lovingly.

This is what I would refer to as a "Liar Bow", because it's not a bow, but it's also not a lyre.

I wish I had more to add here, but honestly that about covers it. The show introduces a magic crystal, says two opposing mommy goddesses (literally, their names are Mamamega and Yamimama) are fighting for control of it, tasks a young shrine maiden with forming a party to protect the goddess of light while she "purifies" the crystal, then sends the party to rescue said shrine maiden after she is kidnapped during a surprise ambush, all before the dark goddess can sacrifice her to destroy the crystal instead. It's absolutely straightforward in every regard, requiring you to use your imagination to fill in any blanks in the story implications.

And as I always say, that's not a bad thing! It's just also nothing special. You're really not missing anything noteworthy if you skip this one (hell, it's actually a bit tricky to even find it these days - I had to dig around on Archive.org for a downloadable copy, and I feel compelled to mention here that the Wayback Machine is currently still in danger of being potentially shut down at any time), but it remains an interesting product of the era all the same.

You may assume that I sped this gif up for comedic purposes, but you would be incorrect. I'm making a clear point here that this show is much more lighthearted than it is sexual.

For follow-up recs, pretty much any Slayers-esque fantasy anime will suffice, but I'm going to give a special shoutout to another late-90s title called Those Who Hunt Elves. A group of teenagers get mysteriously transported to a fantasy world (yes, they had plenty of isekai shows back then too) and must find the words to a spell that can teleport them back home. However, the words in question are inconviently tattooed on the bodies of various elves scattered around the world, meaning the group has to capture and strip every elf they find in order to retrieve the full spell. Also they travel around in a fucking tank. It's a ridiculous comedy with a cheeky but lighthearted premise, and I guarantee it will hit the same vibe as Megami Paradise. It's also apparently banned in China (?!), so you know it MUST be good!

If you're looking for something raunchier or more explicit, Dragon Pink is in the same ballpark (I had mixed feelings on this one, personally), as well as Magic Woman M and F-Force. And while I generally try to include a non-anime option in my recs section for each review, American cartoons are too skittish about panties to ever allow them to be shown onscreen (outside of "adult comedy" shows of the Family Guy variety, anyway), so you'll be hard-pressed to find anything even remotely similar to Megami Paradise in that realm.

No seriously, go watch that harp video I linked earlier in the review. This is an accurate representation of what it did to me on a visceral mental level back when I first saw it!

Alright, that's another nudie anime down. Might be a while before I can get to the next one, but I can all but assure you it will be something significantly dirtier!