OVA, watched on May 21, 2026

Director: Yamada Katsuhisa

Rating: ★★★★

Note: This entry is a direct sequel to this media log entry for the Oz manga.

Thoughts: This was kinda hilarious as an adaptation because it removes everything I didn't enjoy about the manga that I wrote about in my initial review (including whole characters like Filicia's sister), meaning someone on the OVA team probably had the same thoughts I had...but they don't exactly replace the missing scenes with anything either LOL. Therefore, the first part of this OVA is more like a random assortment of the best scenes from the manga minus the clunky exposition and transitional scenes, while the second part is entirely just the manga's climax. If you never read the manga, this will probably be a somewhat confusing watch where scenes just jump from one to another. An OVA for the true #OzHeads (which I guess I now am because I begrudgingly still keep thinking about this bizarre franchise).

Aesthetically, I liked this. While the animation isn't anything to write home about, the character designs were stylized well and translated the manga style nicely. I have to give a special shout out to the backgrounds in particular, because they gave me a better sense for the setting than the manga did (where a lot of the backgrounds are just generic tiled walls). The voice acting was also well done. They gave 1019 a distinctly female voice, which upped the gender ambiguous vibe compared to the manga where I just viewed him as more of a generic bishounen. Turns out 1019's VA was also the same one as Hokuto no Ken's Mamiya :0 Crazy range, she sounded more feminine as Mamiya when compared to how husky 1019 sounded (think Sailor Uranus).

While I did mention that the OVA might be a bit hard to follow if you never read the comic, it simultaneously also made certain things more clear to me. Like I said, the backgrounds help give a better sense of the physical setting, but the way the dialogue was altered also helped to make some of the concepts more clear. I think it's because they condensed the text for time, which helped get rid of some of the extraneous details.

Something I didn't mention in my OG review is that at times, I felt like the manga leaned a bit...conspiratorial lol? The plot is literally "this one family with a Jewish last name are pulling the strings behind all the world's problems", not helped by the mangaka literally writing in the notes at the end that she was inspired by the Rothschild family LOL. The heroine is also from this family tho and helps save the day, so it's not Angel Cop levels anti-semitic, but just something to note going into this series. I found that the OVA tones this down quite a bit, which is another reason why I prefer this anime to its source material.

While I liked how they handled the final scene a lot, I was disappointed they got rid of Muto and 1019's kiss at the very end! That was such a thrilling part of the climax, but I guess they either wanted to downplay the BL undertone or thought they didn't build up enough of their relationship compared to the manga.

In conclusion, I think this is a good way to experience the Oz story if you're like me and read the comic, enjoyed the skeleton we got but found the process of actually reading it to be taxing (a very limited demographic lol). This functions more like promotional material for fans of the manga, but I think if you just want a vintage OVA to watch casually, this is a fairly enjoyable one that isn't too much of a time investment.

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