Don't let my awful synopsis fool you—Ayane's High Kick has absolutely nothing to do with Kunimitsu selling Ayane through the sex trade (at least, not yet...). It's quite the contrary, actually. Ayane's High Kick is essentially about a girl named Ayane that gets "tricked" into changing from pro-wrestling to kickboxing. The shift in her dreams is not only a very dramatic experience, but is also one of the most insightful looks into the human psyche that I've ever seen... or not. In actuality, Ayane's High Kick is another no-brained action/sports anime along the same lines as such series as Dan Doh (a golf anime). As a plus, Ayane's High Kick at least has much better characters than the ones in Dan Doh, but that REALLY isn't saying much at all.

The basis of Ayane's High Kick is simple: Ayane stinks at wrestling, so she starts training for kickboxing without realizing it (she thinks a really weird guy named Kunimitsu is training her for pro-wrestling). When she discovers she was deceived, she plans how to beat the crap out of Kunimitsu... right after she beats up the woman across the ring. Thus, Ayane quickly becomes part of the kickboxing world. For some bizarre reason, though, Ayane becomes a really amazing kickboxer in just a matter of weeks despite not doing anything but kicking and running all day long. She is taught no techniques, nor is she taught how to dodge, and yet she masters it instantly.

Well, with it being just a mere two-episode OVA series (lasting about 55 minutes), I wasn't expecting anything along the lines of Hajime no Ippo anyway. Unfortunately, even with all of the mental preparation I went through before watching this, my hopes were still way too high. Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean that Ayane's High Kick is completely devoid of any redeeming qualities.

First, the quality of the animation in the OVA surprised me somewhat, though it did have its problems. On one hand, the animation featured in Ayane's High Kick is actually above average. On the other hand, both the action scenes and non-action scenes alike suffer from the same problem Record of Lodoss War had: reusing the same animation and stills over and over and over again. Now, normally something like this wouldn't be much of a problem, but it seems as if the enemies here only know one or two moves tops, making the fights more monotonous than I ever thought possible. As a positive, though, the fights all proceed very smoothly; almost no monologues take place in any of them like in other fighting anime series like Initial D and Hajime no Ippo. The music was pretty generic for a sports anime, but certainly wasn't bad at all; it just didn't stand out.

The characters, on the other hand, have absolutely no redeeming qualities whatsoever. I'm sad to say that there is not a single character that I liked -- not a single character existed in the series that wasn't annoying. Not only that, but not a single character was developed past their introductions either. The whole character situation isn't helped at all by the fact that the "bad guy" is voiced by none other than Kawamura Maria, whom many of you may know as the voice of Naga from the anime Slayers. In the end, Ayane's foe really is nothing more than a really crappy clone of Naga, except that she is somehow even MORE annoying. I didn't think it was possible for that to happen, but I've apparently been proven wrong. Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, the rest of the characters failed to pass muster... with flying colors!

The main problem with Ayane's High Kick, though, is how it ends... or in the case of this, doesn't end. Not only does the final fight end in probably the most anti-climactic way possible, but the anime ends with absolutely no closure whatsoever. One thing I was wondering was what, of course, what the heck is going to happen to Ayane and her kickboxing career. I continued wondering that up until the credits stopped rolling and realized that I wasn't even going to get to see an epilogue. Thus, I'm left sitting at my chair with a disappointed frown on my face, never to know what happens to Ayane or finding out who the hell Kunimitsu is or how he manages to train day and night Ayane AND work part-time at a restaurant.

Take my advice: dodge this OVA and watch Hajime no Ippo or, if you're really desperate for a boxing anime, One Pound Gospel.