Dirty Pair

There was a certain clip that got me into watching this show. However, it never hurts to look back into old shows mainly for the fun of it when you have current bangers. I mean, some of them can be good. Some of them can be bad. Then you have some that are just average for the fun of it. Dirty Pair, is an example of what it's highly known for. Average and fun with the premise being obvious. Based on a light novel series of the same name that originally came out in 1980, written by Haruka ... Takachiho. Five years later, Nippon Sunrise has produced this series with Toshifumi Takizawa as the director for episodes one to fourteen until Norio Kashima taking over for episodes fifteen to twenty-four and the two OVA's counting as episodes twenty-five and twenty-six. Don't worry, we're gonna cover those OVA's down the road. Oddly, here in MyAnimeList, they each have their own section. Oh, well. Tsukasa Dokite does the character designs. Junichi Akutsu does the mechanical designs. Fujihiko Hosono is responsible for the uniform designs. The music has been done by Toshiyuki Kimori. There is a a lot more about this show, but that would mean I'd have to cover it's cancellation as well as it's association with Nozomi Entertainment and a Kickstarter campaign to release the whole set on Blu-ray in both in original Japanese and with the creation of a new English dub being produced by Headlines Studios a few years back. I do suggest looking at it through Wikipedia since all of that information is there. Even some YouTube videos if need be.
But for now, let's get to the premise since we've been yapping for a while. The anime, Dirty Pair, has a closer setup to the original light novels yet it has a more comical atmosphere and presents the typical styles of a 1980s inspired future. Which makes plenty of sense given the setting the series takes place. The Dirty Pair, or Lovely Angels as they would call themselves, are Kei and Yuri, voiced by Kyoko Tongu and Saeko Shimazu, work with the WWWA, or 3WA, in Eleanor City, living in an apartment in the city's famous Damocles Tower. They work with the 3WA's chief, Gooley Andrew Francess, voiced by Ikuya Sawaki, who gives Kei and Yuri various missions whether they like it or not or as they were planning to go on a vacation. Sometimes Gooley would offer a bonus or double/triple their pay if the mission is dire, which is more than enough for the girls to tackle the mission. Each of their mission is more of a mission of the week since it could either end peacefully and they get paid, or it could go badly. Hence why Kei and Yuri are often called Dirty Pair due to their reputation of something causing a trail of destruction behind them. The funny thing is that Kei and Yuri do not like being called that yet they still cause some trouble as they are "trouble consultants." If you're part of the world building revolving around science fiction and fighting through various troubles, chances are that you would leave a trail of destruction. But the girls aren't the only ones who goes into their missions. They have two companions assisting them. A Coeurl they call Mughi, who does help out in the field even for being a scardy cat, and a droid named Namno, who can assist them with machinery and hacking like R2-D2. Don't worry, I will explain that as we go into this review.
So, you could say that there is a bit of a story to this, but it's safe to say that this is more of an adventures type of scenario with Kei and Yuri going on a mission, talk about various topics, bickering with one another on occasion, and sharing bits of their past. For example, in one of the missions, they get ambushed by these space pirates and the leader knows Kei like their childhood friends. Then you have this mission where they actually break into this facility because Yuri had a childhood friend being an engineer who got kidnapped along with others to work on warships. Then you have episodes that puts Kei and Yuri in odd ends like they have to help this young man who needs his lover being avenged, yet it was a statue that was crushed by one of their escape pods crashed into his manor on purpose. Yet the twist is he's allergic to women. Hence why the statue keeps him company besides his female maid who does the cleaning and cooking. There was also the time when Kei and Yuri were mistaken as robbers because some older couple looks like them with both their hairstyle and color. Yeah, some of these episodes are just weird at times. But, again, the Dirty Pair series does have them going on adventures, and misadventures, where it's a mix of action, mystery, and most of the time, comedy and drama.
As far as the animation goes, it's a good mix on where the pair go into whether it gets them into deep space, into a desert planet, into a city, a setting that's like a spaghetti western, and various other locations where a mission gets Kei and Yuri into. However, at times, I could spot a couple of hiccups here and there as some of them would make me laugh. Sometimes separate, depending on the situation. As the designs goes, it's standard for where every person lives in like in current everyday person in society. There is a mix of space creatures like these mollusks that live in the sewers in one of the episodes. You'll also have robots and AI units roaming around like in the first episode when the city Kei, Yuri, and 3WA live where the supercomputer goes haywire. Another example would be this episode where it involves a foe who was already dead but is still after Kei and Yuri as they're on their way towards a planet. You have to give them credit that it's all about the mission for Kei and Yuri to get paid and go on a vacation like any woman on the job. If I have to be honest, I can't help but think of Mughi being more than a feline. I might be the only one who couldn't help but think of it like a bear unless it's because the fur has me thinking. It is a coeurl, which means that it is a feline. Then you have Namno, who does behave like R2-D2 because of its way of hacking. I might be the only one who can't help but compare the two since the original light novels started around 1980, the same year the Empire Strikes Back came out. Granted, both the light novels and the anime series does pay homage to several other science fiction series. I just can't get the shoes Namno has on, if I have to be honest.
As speaking of Kei and Yuri, they are the center of attention as they are like any other women who have more than one personality whether towards themselves or towards others. Kei is more of the tomboy of the duo as well as being the feisty one. Saying that she's more sexy yet isn't always the case given her attitude. Yuri is the more soft-spoken of the duo as well as mischievous at times. At times, she is bottom-heavy for being more feminine and flirty with cultured, refined men. Both Kei and Yuri do behave like you'd see in any buddy-cop movies/shows with how they behave. They are actually the very first girls with guns that became a genre for future series such as Ghost in the Shell, Black Lagoon, Lycoris Recoil, and various others. This anime walked where future titles can run. Given how current conservative folk behave, they wouldn't love these two. Especially when this anime introduced one of the very first transgender characters who has an episode of their own as well as delivering a message to her lover's father who is as much of a misogynist. Mind you, this series came out in 1985. That silly topic aside, let's get to the other characters. You have Gooley, who is as much as you'd expect from the chief of 3WA who would inform the Lovely Angels as well as helping them out if the need arises. Gooley also has this assistant who gets some screen time, yet he isn't too memorable. Matter of fact, I would remember some of the characters throughout the series whenever Kei and Yuri go on a mission. I did explain some that I remembered. It just takes time for me to remember. Still, some of them are fun given how their personalities carry throughout an episode. That could go the same for their voice acting, delivering some of the emotional moments when. Ranging from cynicism to being over dramatic to being genuine.
Honestly, I do think of this being Cowboy Bebop before Cowboy Bebop. Yet again, this anime is the start of the girls with guns genre that we know as of today, given if some are good or bad. Is this anime perfect? No. Yet it's still entertaining for the duo going out to tackle whatever trouble is happening while causing trouble behind with some cool action sequences. Some of the humor is outdated as far as it goes, yet I still had some good laughs for what the show delivers. Not every episode worked well for me, yet it is expected when you have a series that's more centered as a "mission of the week" setting. It is a fun science fiction soap opera that I would say is worth checking out. I will be giving the Lovely Angels seven badass moments out of ten. 7/10.

I watched the Dirty Pair movie like, 10 years ago and that gave me a pretty good idea of what the TV series would be like.

The main characters, Kei and Yuri, are the Lovely Angels who work for the World Welfare Work Association or WWWA as "trouble consultants", i.e. hired mercenaries who fix issues for profit. As per the movie, they are also known by their popular name, the "Dirty Pair" because every mission they solve results in huge amounts of collateral damage.

The TV series was a little dissapointing in several respects. For one, it didn't bring out the total awesomeness of the Dirty ... Pair's destructive powers like the movies did - there is no "destruction on a massive scale from a relatively minor mission" (except for the first episode). There is destruction, but nowhere in the scale of what is seen in the movies. The TV episodes are also very short so plot development feels very rushed in most episodes.

The only positive is some additional character development. The episode about Billy Galet (Yuri's old love) was particularly well done, but it was an outlier as the rest of the TV episodes didn't go that deep. If you only watched the TV episodes you'd think Kei and Yuri were "girls" only interested in (1) Men (2) Dating (3) New Clothes (4) Bonuses and (5) Vacations. But in reality both women are much more complex characters than that and it didn't come through in the TV series.

Additionally the animation is very sub par and "flat". It might have been ok in the 1980s or mid 1990s but when you take it into the 2000s it falls far short. The music is mediocre also.

Overall, I am a Dirty Pair fan because the girls are "sassy" trouble consultants and it's always nice to see an anime where the heroines are sexy, good at their jobs and feminine without being overly cutesy. The only drawback is the TV series didn't exploit this fully.

I am hoping that the updated "Dirty Pair Flash" or other OVAs will show the Dirty Pair to their full potential because as "we will fix things but oops we blew up (insert item, equipment, building, structure or planet here) something in the process" idea is a good one. All in all, if they made a live action Dirty Pair movie it would probably be great, if the correct actresses can bring the characters to life. The TV series in itself does not fully live up to its potential plot, character or animation wise.

Great vibe; good visual; decent animation; and nostalgic. but I do not recommended it.
This anime followed the classic 80' TV format which is one stand alone story per episode, there is nothing wrong with this format a lot of good animes adapted well but not this one. There is no story line or bigger pictures, it won't make a difference if you watch the 24 episodes in random orders (to be fair there is a story lasted 2 episodes). In short, occasionally there are interesting ideas but Dirty Pair failed to built up anything exciting in a short 24 min(20 min without op, ed, ... and ad break) time spend from start to finish which only makes it feels more unsatisfying and disappointing, and then copy and paste the feeling 23 more times and that is the sum up of Dirty Pair.
If Dirty Pair is going to be re-write in 2023 it will be really interesting cause it got many thing right from setting stand point, the pair protagonist futuristic space setting... man Dirty Pair is a shame.