A flagship title not just for AnimEigo, but for the anime medium itself, it's easy to see how Bubblegum Crisis caught on all those decades ago. It's arresting before you even know what it's about: a moody intro pans over grimy cyberpunk backdrops ripped straight from the coolest PC-98 games, before things go all Streets of Fire as a striking Kenichi-Sonoda-designed woman dons a wig of floofy 80's hair and belts out a blistering rock ballad, all while armed future-cops get murdered by a killer robot. Tonight, as then, a hurricane is coming.

Substantially, it's such that the zeitgeist for a series like this is always depressingly timely, and 2025 is closer to 2032 and feels it, more than even 1987 was. Bubblegum Crisis presents the far-flung, fantastical "future" of a technological dystopia unenforced by a willfully ineffectual police force, with a populace living at the behest of technocrat billionaires and in constant fear of the violent whims of hair-trigger Boomers. The more things change. It's always the right time to discover, or rediscover Bubblegum Crisis, and this Perfect Collection from AnimEigo provides the ideal way to do so.

That's the tenor of Bubblegum Crisis that tracks it as one of the true arbiters of cyberpunk, and it's important to remember that vibe when jumping into this formative, beloved backdrop of the anime scene. It is a stylish show, it is a cool show, but it is not often a fun show. If you're the focal civilian in need in a Bubblegum Crisis entry, you're more than likely to end up dead, with the best to hope for that the Knight Sabers can avenge you, take something from the experience, and try to make things a little better for the next victims. They fail to save the lost child in the first episode. Linna's friend winds up murdered in the second, and that itself sets off a chain of vengeance felt even later in the series. Priss's young neighbor gets orphaned. It's just the nature of the setting. Part of the point of the fourth episode is that, even absent a direct Boomer threat, the oppressive hellscape of MegaTokyo will still constantly take from its people in a way that spirals out and hurts others. That oppressive heat reaches its boiling point in the fifth and sixth episodes—the best ones, for my money—which implicitly-then-explicitly deal in ideas of women, queer, and sex worker liberation. If they're going to treat you like a parasite, you might as well become a vampire. A mecha-piloting, robot, lesbian vampire, because even as it's doing salient, tragic commentary, Bubblegum Crisis isn't going to pass up the opportunity to be cool as shit.

The tone tracks even in escalations that end uncharacteristically well for the Knight Sabers. The seventh episode follows up on Linna's murdered friend in some wholly unexpected ways. It breaks the (some would say deserved) cycle of revenge, and wraps on an almost shockingly idealistic note compared to what came before—still feeling earned, with an appreciable air of catharsis for all of those involved. Small wonder that guest-girl Vision gets promotional billing almost equal to the Knight Sabers for her time in this episode; she deserves that, at least. This is the way of Bubblegum Crisis, from Priss's first-episode opening number through so many other musical performances, including Vision's at the end of episode seven: using powered armor to destroy evil robots is resistance, but so, too, is rock and roll.

If that seventh episode ends on a unique bright spot, the eighth and final episode of the OVA series can feel like downright Opposite Day compared to the rest of Bubblegum Crisis. Coming courtesy of future Ah! My Goddess director Hiroaki Gōda, it's an odd, offbeat cartoon of a thing. This episode eschews commentary on corporate techno-dystopia to depict the daily dalliances of future cops and pit the Knight Sabers against a thinly motivated Evil Scientist Of The Week, showing off their shiny new hardsuits and coming away with some episodic character growth. But it does feature a spunky young reporter girl as a guest star and is the only episode to give any meaningful focus to Nene, so who can say if it's really "bad" or not?

And then just as quickly, that's it for the original run of Bubblegum Crisis. As was the style at the time for OVAs, the series doesn't end so much as it just stops. This, too, is appropriate. Just as Bubblegum Crisis the story is a snapshot of a foretold fictitious future era, Bubblegum Crisis the anime is a snapshot of a time in the industry when productions were flying by the seats of their pants. Whether you ascribe to the dogged old rumors about a falling out cutting the series down from an originally planned longer run, or follow the modern information that the team just never planned that far ahead in the first place, the series regardless comes off as a free-flowing experiment alchemizing the eccentricities of a suite of upcoming artists.

Kenichi Sonoda's designs are instantly iconic as his art always allows. Characters express themselves in their outfits (shout-out to Linna's sharp shirts and ties), their living and working spaces, and the fighting styles embodied in the equipment of their armor. It's attention that comes through in the focal artistry of the anime. There is nudity in this show, but the real pornography is any time there's a loving close-up on the mechanical details of some piece of tech, least of all those hardsuit designs themselves.

As much as each episode adheres to that cyberpunk tone of Bubblegum Crisis, the ways the varied directors express it makes each entry a session unto itself—and a stage to glimpse future masters at work. The ideas propelling the fifth and sixth episodes are affecting, certainly, but it's also amazing how strongly the style of a young Masami Ōbari (or "O'Bari" as he's credited) comes through even in his debut directorial effort. Satoshi Urushihara's touch is unmistakable on the characters in the seventh episode. For all my uncertainty about the tonal match of the eighth episode, I can't deny Goda's mastery of bouncy, characteristic style and intentionally brighter atmosphere.

The clarity with which this artistry comes through confirms AnimEigo's Perfect Collection as the best way to experience Bubblegum Crisis. The cels here are clean, letting the hand-drawn colors and shading on characters, the mechanical detail, and lettered impact frames come through crisply. The neon night backgrounds of MegaTokyo have their details richly visible, while still embodying the dark cyberpunk tone and letting the animation pop against it. I know there's always going to be discerning takes from established fans about how older anime like this is "supposed" to look—whether a certain amount of grain and shadow is required for the feel of a classic. But comparison with the SD music video collections included as extras on this set provide the opportunity to actually compare what Bubblegum Crisis looked like in that lower-res format with this HD version, and the difference is night and day.

Music videos make up the bulk of the extras filling out the Perfect Collection. The two "Hurricane Live!" specials are included in SD, as mentioned, though AnimEigo also went through the trouble of remastering some individual music videos that used only in-show footage, so comparisons with HD versions can be even more direct. The set also includes the "Holiday in Bali" video: a collection of live-action music videos framed around the voice actresses for the Knight Sabers (plus Vision) vacationing in Bali, Indonesia. It's a mildly interesting aside, and some of the escapades tie into discussion from this set's enclosed booklet (which I'll get to in a minute). The most notable draw for this edition is a brand-new interview with Kenichi Sonoda, which sees him fondly reminiscing on his design process for the series, alongside some reflection on his career overall. It might be worth it just to see the bits where he dishes on how he really did not care for Bubblegum Crash.

On the subject of that booklet, this set packs in "All About Bubblegum Crisis", an insert book of interviews and notes that seem to have originally been produced for AnimEigo's 1997 box set release of the series—and at least partially in promotion of the then-upcoming Tokyo 2040 TV anime reboot of the franchise (you can tell it's old because the translation still refers to Ah! My Goddess as Oh! My Goddess). The presentation here is rather bare-bones, likely out of necessity to fit in the standard-size Blu-ray case, but the material is mostly worth cramming in. It casts a wide net of the attached creatives reminiscing on a project that was already ten years old at the time, including Obari highlighting the "passionate drama between leading ladies" of his episodes, and the voice actresses reflecting on how working on the series changed them for the better. This booklet also provides multiple corroborations of the point that Bubblegum Crisis was never "planned" for any longer, preset amount of episodes. Though it does eschew virtually all mention of Youmex, so even that perspective must be taken with a grain of salt. Meanwhile, the dramatic tone insisted on for the episode liner notes, including cliffhanger endings, renders them less useful than I'd like overall, but I understand that AnimeEigo was working with the material they had on this.

That "kitchen sink" effort thus extends to the audio options, including as this set does no less than six different language options (plus Korean for the first three episodes). It's a testament to the widespread appeal of Bubblegum Crisis. Though the English dub may be how so many older anime fans recall being introduced to the series, the way it holds up today can be…charitably confirmed as holding historical value more than anything else. It is ambitious in many ways, re-recording all the songs in English and seemingly attempting to remaster much of the other audio. But the result of that is some of the most limp sound effect mixing I've heard in an anime dub, alongside flat acting, laughable mispronunciations, and questionable casting (if you have never heard Quincy's English dub voice, prepare yourself). Still, as a completing component of a set like this, it's worth having around, and alongside the French, Spanish, Italian, and Catalan dubs, you are not hurting for options for enjoying Bubblegum Crisis with this set.

That's the value of a release like this Perfect Collection, providing the ideal way to obtain Bubblegum Crisis now. It's a convenient, comprehensive package that's tempting if you're a fan who hasn't upgraded since the DVD era or earlier, and the ultimate gateway for any anime fans who were always curious but hadn't yet sampled it. This is a series that is uneven and incomplete, yet feels perfectly formed as itself. It's steeped in the style of a specific era, yet it feels timeless in its mood and messaging. Bubblegum Crisis is a classic that is often imitated, but never duplicated—not even by itself, as seen in the myriad sequels, spin-offs, and reboots that have never attained its inciting level of fame. It's worth watching as a cool series on its own, and to see the evolutionary step it represents for the OVA era of anime, the careers of creators who would go on to legend status, and as a turning point for the medium in the West. And it's worth owning in this form to see all that.