The tragic tale of Brandon Heat and Harry McDowell

Tweekums

This twenty six episode series follows childhood friends Harry McDowell and Brandon Heat as they rise from being a couple of street punks to being major figures in the Millennion crime syndicate. At first things go well and they are taken under the wing of Millennion's boss Big Daddy but in time things change; Harry is determined to rise to the very top of the organisation and that will mean getting rid of both Brandon and Big Daddy. When Harry gets his hands on technology that enables him to run an army of the dead known as Orgmen it looks like Harry will run the organisation for a very long time but then after thirteen years he learns that Big Daddy had a daughter, Mika, and he decides she must die too. This is a mistake as the man who helps her survive his attack has the technology to bring Brandon back from the dead. Once back Brandon is determined to protect Mika and have revenge against the people who killed him and the people he cared about.

I must admit that I had some difficulty getting into the story during the first couple of episode but after that found myself gripped by the plot and the interesting characters. The back of the DVD case may say this is about Brandon seeking revenge against his former friend Harry but until the half-way point they are still the closest of friends. Because of this we believe in their friendship before we see it break down in such a terminal manner. This also makes it all the more tragic when characters we've grown to care about start dying… unlike Brandon the others don't get to come back. I liked the character designs; in particular I liked how we saw Harry age over the series; from a young man to a middle aged one with grey hair and a lined face. Surprisingly despite all he did the creators managed to keep his character somewhat sympathetic making his ultimate demise feel as tragic… I'm not ashamed to admit I shed a few tears at the end! Overall I'd say this is well worth watching if you want a character led anime that also has plenty of action; just remember some of it is quite bloody so it isn't really suitable for younger viewers.

score 9/10

Tweekums 1 September 2013

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2861732/