I love the Salvation Army. They sell a bunch of trash that I don't need but will buy anyway for reasonable prices. As a matter of fact, the last time I was there, they were selling VHS tapes for 10 cents a piece. Now, I know what you're thinking. "VHS?!? Why would you want any VHS tapes?!?", maybe if some of the teenyboppers happen to be here they might not even know what a VHS tape is.

Ah, VHS, I remember you from my youth. The constant rewinding, the leaving them out on the floor where they would get stepped on and ruined, the tape malfuntions...

Anyways, I happened to pick up two tapes of what I'm assuming are OAV (that's Original Anime Video for those of you who are clueless). One was called "MD Geist" which I've done no research on and haven't watched yet.

The other was "Gunsmith Cats". This is an anime about two girls who, for whatever reason, own a gun shop called (appropriately enough) Gunsmith Cats. The main protagonists are Rally Vincent, the gun expert and Minnie May Hopkins, the bomb expert.

Eye: A lot of time was spent searching for locations for GSC and it shows. It's visually very well done. The animation is fluid, though typical of 90's anime. Now, I don't favor Japanese animation to American animation or vice versa. But I've got to say that the Japanese seem to put more effort into making their cartoons look good. There are exceptions, but that's the case for the most part. Overall, GSC looks good.

Eye score: 9/10

Ear: I love the theme song. It's a very upbeat jazzy tune which captures the essence of the show rather nicely. Most of the soundtrack is done in either jazz or soft rock. The thing about GSC, though, is that there's a lot of gunshots and explosions. A LOT. Like, in every other scene. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but there was just something weird about the way they sounded. It was probably just my imagination or perhaps my particular copy, but nonetheless. GSC's sound is about average. The theme song is above average.

Ear score: 8/10

Head: Oh, boy... my brain was having a field day with this thing. Why do these girls even own a gun shop? Why the heck does Minnie May have so many bombs? What the heck is the Russian chick's coat made of that makes it bulletproof? And so on, and so forth. Dissecting GSC to its very roots would completely ruin it. It's a blatant action film so I'll let it slide, though. One thing I did notice was that a few times the laws of physics seemed to have been bent ever so slightly to allow for (dare I say it?) fanservice.

Head score: 7/10

Heart: From an intelligent standpoint, GSC makes no sense. But the fact of the matter is, when dealing with a movie, a book, a tv show, or anything other form of storytelling, the heart wins over the head. I don't care that half this stuff would never play out the way it does in reality; it's fun! And sure there's a lot of fanservice going on; so what? Gunsmith Cats is just fun to watch. It's a cartoon for crying out loud, why does it have to make sense? That having been said, despite all my over-exaggeration that GSC makes no sense, it really isn't so bad. The plot is fairly easy to follow, and for the most part it's only tiny elements that confuse me.

Heart score: 9/10

Overall, Gunsmith Cats is a fun little OAV. It's about an hour and a half in running time so I managed to kill an afternoon watching it. If you can hunt down a copy for a reasonable price, I'd recommend it.

Overall score: 8/10