Monster Rancher Review By Rashad Moore (TV Series-Based on the Tecmo monster game series)

Once there was a time when a little craze from Japan called Pokemon literally took America by storm, it started out as an innocent little game and anime series, but then it grew into a massive marketing phenomenon. Soon after, even more "monster anime" started showing up. First Digimon (in which fans gave up their Pikachu for an Agumon) and now Monster Rancher. Based on the Playstation game in which you breed and battle your own monster (the option to get a monster based on a CD was so much fun by the way) has now spawned an anime series, and it officially scrapes the bottom of the anime barrel.

When a brash young boy named Genki (which means healthy in Japanese) wins a game tournament playing his favorite game "Monster Battler," (a game he is literally obsessed with) and wins the latest sequel, he rushes home to play

the new game when al of the sudden Genki is whisked away into the universe of Monster Battler. He meets a pretty young lady named Holly and Swazo, a yellow eyeball monster. He learn that Holly is in search of the Pheonix, a supermonster that is capable of stopping Muu, an evil supermonster bent on world domination. Along their journeys they meet Hare, the self-proclaimed genius, Golem, a huge rock monster with a soft heart, Moochi, obviously the poor man's Pikachu, and Tiger(think of him as part Heero Yuy and part Piccolo in a wolf's body).

While I still consider Pokemon to be the best show out of the three, Monster Rancher does have a more involving(if unoriginal) plot. Although its the standard story of a gang of heroes out to stop an evil force plot you've seen in every RPG game and Fantasy anime, it also never tends to get too repetitive like Pokemon and Digimon does. The overall mood is way more serious, and the characters also share more human qualities as Digimon did. Each character is very well-defined. Genki seemed like a action hero straight out of a movie within his brash, upbeat exterior (in other words a God, he manages to beat and bumrush almost every monster that stands in their way. Moochi tries hard to be the Pikachu of the show, but is really just a lame wannabe that nowhere near as appealing. Hare and Swazo provide effective comedy relief, and the more deeper characters such as Holly, Tiger, and Golem are interesting to learn about. The overall monster count dwarfs both Pokemon and Digimon with 400 monsters, but it is also cheap. Other monsters look very much alike on certain occasions, such as the supposed "baddie" monsters. Also, the story is very interesting, but the overall plot development moves as just about as fast as Psyduck's brain. The plot really tends to drag through every episode(Think Dragon Ball Z's Freeza Saga, but not as tedious) and other episodes(such as the heroes encounter with a mysterious robot and Golem falling for a water sprite who turns out to be one of Muu's cronies) serve as abrupt but effective distractions. But after a while you start to wonder when the hell they will ever find the Phoenix. Monster Rancher approaches borderline American writing. Now if only the new episodes will arrive....

But overall, Monster Rancher felt blatantly inferior and less appealing than Pokemon. The animation and character design are a tad more complex than the simpler designs of Pokemon. But the quality of the animation is far more impressive. The music is a far different matter. The score (which was also "Americanized") comes off cheap and underdramatic(not to mention taken from other cartoons) which really makes us which for Bandai's more direct approach with Gundam Wing, and also wonder about the original Japanese music. (DBZ composer, Shunsuke Kikuchi would have been perfect for this show BTW, but that's just my opinon) and the theme song can be described in the words of a certain fat Simpsons comic book nerd, ("Worst opening theme ever!!)

Overall, that's my two cents. I didn't get into Monster Rancher as I did Pokemon. (Maybe because of the music.) It felt like a cheap imitation of Pokemon (the unlock the disk rap was a lame and blantant plug to the game), but I shook off my doubts and actually saw that it was a little more mature than Pokemon. While Pokemon has humor and an overall cute cast of characters, Monster Rancher, while flawed, doesn't go for cuteness, it just wants to tell a story, and that sits well with me.

Available BKN/Fox Kids Network/ADV Films. Image shown is not by atek studios. Review by Rashad Moore. June 2000.