Ghost Talker's Daydream 8/10

The DVD cover has a girl in a leather bustier in full S&M mode. How could I NOT pick this up?

A recent OAV release that bucks the recent trend of the industry to shy away from such things. Luckily it's better then most.

On the technical side this OAV is of excellent quality. Detailed backgrounds and well animated, consistent animation throughout as is to be expected from an OAV. The character designs are a little gritty looking, keeping in tune with the more mature content of the stories here and while I'm more a fan of brighter coloured, cuter designs I can appreciate the reasons for not going that way with this show. The music was nothing memorable and the VA's were great as always. This show had the ED credits rolling over a black background and I never like that. Pan over a lewd picture of the female lead characters or something. These 4 episodes came out in 2004.

The story here is about a 20 odd year old young lady named Misaki Saiki who is able to see and communicate with the lingering spirits of those who are trapped in the mortal realm. AKA: She talks to ghosts, think The Sixth Sense kid. She works as a consultant to help stop hauntings and such. Since she doesn't make enough to live on doing this she works a second job...as a dominatrix at an S&M club. I love manga authors, they always keep things interesting. She works with a fellow who hires her for the jobs and is stalked by a high school guy who also helps her at times with information. We also meet a high school girl named Ai in the first episode who can also see spirits and ends up filling in for Misaki when she's on vacation.

The episodes here don't really get into the whole back story, it's just 3 cases with the final 2 episodes covering the 3rd one. In the first episode, Misaki and co. meet Ai and help her uncover the truth behind her older sister's apparent murder of her baby and subsequent suicide. In the second episode, Ai gets involved with a ghost she meets on a railway bridge and Misaki must rush to her rescue. The third and best story is over the final 2 episodes. Misaki goes on vacation and gets involved in a 12 year old serial killer case when the bodies of the missing children are unearthed at a construction site. The whole team ends up showing up and helping her out, with an ample amount of hot springs fan-service.

This show really follows the recent trend on U.S. TV with criminal investigators using the spirits of the dead to help solve crimes. (Medium being the current cream of that crop.) This show has quite a bit of adult themed comedy and nudity in it to make it feel alot different than those U.S. TV shows and I found myself feeling a little disappointed that there were only 4 episodes. This show is also not dependant on the whole Japanese spiritual side of things, it really feels more western in it's take on ghosts and such. More like The Sixth Sense, I wonder if there was any influence there.

This OAV looked great and was very entertaining. More would be welcome. Highly recommended.