Gunslinger Girl 9/10

I need a team of cyborg assassins for my secret government agency. Who to use? Little girls of course!

Another girls with guns show? Nope. Well yes. This show follows in the recent footsteps of Noir and Madlax by getting into the whole "young girl assassin" genre.

These 13 episodes were released as OAVs with games of the same name in 2003. On the technical side this show looks and sounds amazing. I understand each episode had a huge budget ($130,000 US) which really shows. Every scene looks amazing, the backgrounds are amazing, the few CG effects are amazing, the score is incredible and the VA's are perfect. Especially our little main assassin girl Henrietta who has a perfect quiet little voice that contrasts amazingly well with her killing bunches of bad guys. I'm shilling a little here but this show really looks incredible and it's the rare show that maintains this level of quality throughout.

I would like to take this opportunity to nominate the opening of this show for best ever. The song is called "The Light Before We Land" by the Delgados (who just broke up Aug 2005) on their album "Hate". Is pretty awesome. It's a Scottish band and the song sounds like something out of Lord of the Rings.

So, does the story keep up to the amazing production values? Well yes. The show is set in Italy where this intelligence branch rescues dying girls and turns them into cyborgs for use as assassins. The girls still LOOK like girls but are now super fast and super strong. They are trained to kill and somewhat brainwashed so they forget their former lives and are able to follow their orders without question. Each is paired with an older male agent as fratellos. (Italian for siblings) The show follows the lives of the girls and focuses on their relationships with their male counterparts.

This could be a cue for a perverted tilt to the show but it keeps well away from anything of the sort. In fact the guys rarely touch the girls and we thankfully get no sexual tension or fan-service to ruin the series. The main characters, Henrietta and Jose are perhaps the best duo. She is quiet and the most like a normal girl and Jose treats her like an older brother, buying her presents and being unfailingly kind to her. This is in contrast to some of the other fratellos. One pairing is more like a stern father and daughter, one is like a grandfather and daughter and of course there are a couple of fratellos where the man treats his charge like a weapon and a weapon only.

This leads to a series of examinations of the effect these relationships have on the girls. The series tries to answer the question "If you HAD to do this, what is the best way to deal with the situation." Of course there is no easy answer. What happens if one of a pair is killed? What if they don't get along? Remember, these girls could kill their partner without breaking a sweat.

The show also deals with the inevitable effects of the cyborg implants on the girls. It shortens their lifespans and causes memory loss. The brainwashing or "conditioning" screws them up too. These girls were rescued from death by the implants they get. Are their lives worth living considering the alternative?

I liked the story here and along with some pretty cool action scenes was highly entertained. I was ALSO a little disturbed at the plight of these girls. I come from a society where we shield children from almost everything bad in the world. While I currently disagree with that way of raising kids I find as I get older I can see why parents feel that way is best. These girls have to deal with things much older people would have problems dealing with. I really felt sorry for them.

One of the minor characters puts it best at the end of the series: "It's a shame that they have to be cyborgs."

Highly recommended.