Chargeman Ken is a 1974 short anime series that ran for 65, seven minute episodes. The series is available LEGALLY for FREE via Crunchyroll.

Chargeman Ken just might be the best, most awful thing in anime. And I mean that in a nice way.

The 65 episode series is so unashamedly awful that it has redefined internet memes decades after it's final airing. And yet, it's the awfulness of the entire visual package that makes it a must see. From it's shoddy, rushed animation, to it's blatant design stealing of Speed Racer and Johnny Quest, it's lack of sound effects and it's absentee plots, the show is actually so bad, it's fantastic.

Rating this anime was a chore. While I doubt that anybody watching this will ever consider a majority of it's episodes to be "imitative behavior" the sudden shock value violence that randomly appears disqualifies it from the Tween rating I almost gave it. It's astounding to think that this qualified as "children's entertainment" in 1974 when you consider how many episodes feature death and cruelty just out of the blue.

Chargeman Ken follows the story of a ten year old little boy, who lives in the distant and highly robotic year of 2074. Everyone has flying cars, everyone has at least one annoying robot sidekick, and Ken randomly transforms into a magical boy.

Where did he get his powers from? Why does he have them? This is never explained. Ever.

Ken has a deadly laser gun, has his own flying car, and two of the most negligent parents in all of anime. His mother and father let him out at all hours of the day and night, and do not seem to care at all that their ten year old is fighting an entire race of aliens by himself, and often, past curfew. They watch him frequently get himself into life and death situations, yet stand still and offer him no form of support.

Accompanying Ken is his six-then-seven year old little sister Caron, who wears far too much makeup, a dress that qualifies as just a long shirt, old lady beads and often, a pair of shoes the animators frequently forget to finish drawing. Since Ken's parents are unbelievably useless, it's up to Ken to raise his sister, though being a little boy still, he sometimes teases her. They are joined by a robot named Barican, who is equally as worthless as Ken's parents, only very, very vocal.

Ken's main enemies come from the Juralian race, led by a demonic alien who can't seem to plan ahead. No explanation is given for these people - or most of the plot for that matter, so let's just say they're here for world domination. Sound good? Cool.

Since every other human Ken meets is really one of these aliens in disguise, Ken finds himself having just moments to scream "CHARGING GO!!" the transformation phrase that turns him into Chargeman Ken... where he does a slow backflip and gets himself a new helmet and a belt. Seriously. That's it. Even when not transformed, he is usually wearing three quarters of his own costume ALL THE TIME unless he is sleeping. It's like if Clark Kent were to walk around with the entire Superman costume, and then scream "This looks like a job for Superman" and just add the cape. 

Once transformed, Ken engages the aliens in a short batter, before either shooting them outright, or firing a laser from his plane. Even in the final episode, where the army is called in to help, Ken is relegated to just two or three blasts and *poof* the day is saved.

The only consistent weaknesses he has would be darkness and a sore throat. Without the combination of light and his screaming "CHARGEMAN GO!!" he cannot transform into Chargeman Ken. This again, is never explained. Much like the existence of a children's toy line for this series, it just plain "is".

Chargeman Ken is rife with animation errors, cel slips and some of the most sporadic violence of any anime of it's kind, and yet all of it's flaws makes this show a guilty pleasure. You just haven't lived until you've binged this short anime.

Magic Knight Rayearth is currently available on Hulu and ConTV with subscriptions. Each episode runs 25 minutes in length and lasted for 49 episodes between October of 1994 and November of 1995.

For years, anytime I mentioned watching Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon, I would always be asked by rabid CLAMP fans if I had seen Magic Knight Rayearth, arguably one of their most popular titles besides Cardcaptor Sakura. In the 1990's, my mother had a few single-print issues from the manga in her collection, but outside of finding a bootlegged VHS tape here or there, I never really had the chance to sit down and watch more than two episodes until recently.

And now, after all these years, I can understand why this was routinely recommended to me.

Magic Knight Rayearth is a swashbuckling story, surrounding three Middle School girls, who get abducted one day on a trip to Tokyo Tower. With almost no explanation, the girls are entrusted with the future of the magical, rural, parallel world of Cephiro, which we learn very late in the series is actually a younger-sister to Earth, by a centuries old but very boyish looking sorcerer named Clef. Clef also entrusts them with the task of saving - but later killing - the Pillar and Princess Emeraude.

What is a Pillar you ask? Well it's a title for a person whose job it is to pray for and think only of the planet Cephiro. All day. Every day. 24/7. Non-stop. Literally, you can't even fall in love, or have another thought other than the well-being of Cephiro. You get distracted by a so much as ONE cat video on Facebook and guess what? Ka-BOOM. Planet dead. Seriously, this may be the single most annoying job anybody will ever have in this series. The first season is all about finding the current Pillar, because Cephiro is starting to crumble, while the second season is about replacing the Pillar, because the damn planet is blowing up. That's just terrifying to think that if one person has a brain fart, you're screwed.

Aside from the nonsense of the Pillar, we find the girls also having to fight deadly monsters and acquire new weapons in order to do their job effectively. 

Hikaru is the most popular character of the trio, and is a pink and red haired tomboy of sorts. While she's 14 at the start of the show, she's still oh so very much a little girl in certain aspects, but it's that innocence that helps her to make friends easily, and eventually sort out this Pillar business.

Umi is a pretty and rich girl with blue hair and a bit of a selfish streak. She freaks out easily and has a temper, but is often the comic relief.

Fuu is the typical "smart kid" stereotype, complete with glasses. She's also the most normal looking character in the series, with blonde hair and green eyes. She serves as the voice of reason for Umi, but similar to Umi does have a slight ego, as we see in episode five, where she explains that she holds herself more dear than anyone else.

The girls are soon joined by a little rabbit creature named Mokona, who is so popular, he's appeared in dozens of ads on his own, other CLAMP productions and in the 1990's, was the single most popular mascot character for anime websites, at least until Pokemon debuted. But despite being adorable, Mokona is hiding a darker secret. Kinda sorta... he's God. But not. But kinda yeah. It makes more sense later on in the series. The red gem on his forehead can produce items and all sorts of useful things for the girls, or transmit messages from Clef.

The series has plenty of sword fighting and stock-magic attacks for those who like the Magical Girl genre. The pacing of the fights is action packed, and the animation is very fluid and smooth for a 1990's TV series.

The first few episodes, the writing is hyper, and you just want to hand the girls a cup of decaf, but around five or six episode sin, the girls begin to settle into their new roles, and it doesn't feel as jumbled anymore.

One of the show's stronger points is that the girls behave like regular 14 year old girls. As I mentioned earlier about Hikaru, the girls are still caught between childhood and the teen years. Sure they fall in love and have adult emotions, but those are balanced by segments where the girls are still learning about the world and sorting through these new feelings and growing up.

It's also nice to see that the girls are not being overtly sexualized, though the opening is a tad too revealing during the transformation segment. The girls are fully clothed, I'm very grateful for that.

Magic Knight Rayearth starts off girly, but then becomes very heavy in magic and action. If you haven't seen anything of CLAMP before, this is a good place to start.

Doamaiger-D reruns currently air on Funimation. The series has been re-titled as "Doamayger-D" for the North American market, but currently runs in subtitled form. Each episode lasts 2 minutes 39 seconds. 13 episodes were animated.

Doamaiger-D is a classic throwback to 1960's and 1970's anime, but animated using computer software, much akin to Anime Studio.

The short series is centered around 17 year old Daijirou, who has recently inherited a traditional Japanese sweets shop in Kyoto. Daijirou's father abandoned the family when he was growing up, and at the start of the series, Daijirou hates his father for running away.

One day, Daijirou finds a giant mech his father has left behind in the basement of the sweets shop. Around the same time, evil robots and giant monsters start creeping up all throughout Kyoto, some of whom originated as angsty humans whose hearts have turned. Realizing that he can save the town with the mech and his knowledge of making perfect confectioneries, Daijirou pilots the mech (Doamaiger) into town, using the mech to deliver a final blow to each monster while also giving the original person a sweet that brings them back to normal. As he solves the issues of the monsters one by one, he's followed by a very 1960's inspired news reporter, who has a little crush on him.

(Lady, he's 17. Don't be a PedoBear.)

As the series goes on, Doamaiger faces destruction from battle a few times, while Daijirou earns himself a rival in an American tycoon named Robert. Robert speaks with a Texan-dialect, mispronouncing hard "A's" in his words while flaunting how much money he's made. He intends to take over the Japanese sweets business using his army of soulless, American robots. These scenes are at times funny, but also a little uncomfortable to watch, as the anti-American sentiment is hammered in hard. Robert's scenes teeter between tongue-in-cheek humor based off of some of our more disrespectful celebrities, and blatant racism.

Very late in the series, Daijirou finds himself face to face with his father again, and in a very cliche way, learns the true motive behind his father's abandonment. His father (who looks very much like an octopus) pilots his own mech, and eventually teams up with his son to face Robert.

The ending of the series is very predictable, and ties up all of the loose ends in a blink-and-you-miss-it fashion. Doamaiger's fate leaves much to be desired, so I can't say I can recommend episode 13.

There is a bit of education to the series as a bonus. Extra text scrolls across the top and sides of the screen, prompting a second and third replay. If you don't pause the screen to read them, you'll miss out on brief lessons abut Japanese culture, and about many of the sweets Daijirou is making.

Doamaiger-D is extremely short, with all episodes combined lasting just slightly more than a half an hour. It would have worked better as a 30 minute OVA, instead of a 13 episode short series. The 60's nostalgia is there, but the animations are jittery, bearing resemblance to cutouts from a coloring book. Still, it's a cute tribute to old TV anime.