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The Series

[Rating:4.5/5]

I don’t often use such technical terms in a review, but Kill Me Baby (キルミーベイベー ) is just one cool anime series. Based on the manga series written and illustrated by Kaduho, the anime version is quick-paced, off-kilter, and just wacky fun.

Oribe Yasuna is an oddball, well-meaning, and happy-go-lucky high school girl who is the self-proclaimed best friend of fellow high school student Sonia, a foreign-trained assassin. Although Sonia puts up with Yasuna’s weird and sometimes annoying behavior, she’s also quite violent toward her. For instance, if Yasuna sneaks up on her, she’ll use her martial arts skills on her, or if she gets very annoyed with Yasuna’s often childish and airheaded behavior, she’s not above putting her in a chokehold and knocking her out. But Yasuna is fine with it, as long as they get to be friends and she keeps Sonia from killing anybody else. The two are also friends with the weirdly laid-back Goshiki Agiri, a ninja from the same organization as Sonia. Agiri often confounds the two of them with her rather unusual “ninjitsu”. Most of the time, these amount to simple magic tricks or practical jokes, but she really can pull out some real skills unexpectedly, just not when they are really needed.

This offbeat series is one that hardly lets up with the gags, both physical and in witty dialogue. Combined with its kawaii, chibi-like character designs and an overall animation that focuses in on the main characters (other characters are often just white blobs), Kill Me Baby is a hilarious and entertaining laugh-riot.

At first, it is difficult to see why Yasuna would even want to be around someone so violent toward her all the time, but once you settle in to this series, you realize that none of this is meant to be serious, this is all meta-comedy at its furthest reaches. Yasuna, herself, is way, way out there, a constant fountainhead of inane ideas, like sticking her head in an empty can or coming into school while she’s sick so she can share her illness with Sonia. The mile-a-minute pace with which the two girls interact gives the series an energetic feeling, one that starts from the opening credits’ electro-punk theme song and continues right through the groovy EDM of the closing song.

The final episode does a good job of giving us a deeper look into the true feelings that both characters really have for each other, but it would have been even better if some of this were incorporated earlier on and throughout the series. Still, this is one nearly perfect, hilarious, laugh a minute ride, despite the reuse of many of the physical gags throughout the episodes.

Video Quality

[Rating:4/5]

The sketch-like look of many of the backgrounds really comes through well in this AVC/MEPG-4 1080p encodement to Blu-ray of Kill Me Baby from Sentai Filmworks, despite some softness in the overall image. A mixture of strong primary colors and more delicate pastels, the digital animation gets a good clean transfer with the slightest hint of color banding on some of the solid fills in the backgrounds and so forth, otherwise this looks really strong.

Audio Quality

[Rating:4/5]

Japanese and an English dub are included in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Stereo (48kHz/24-bit). The english voice cast does a decent job with this series, but they still can’t match the acting skills of the Japanese cast that is so funny and over-the-top, they just completely embody these characters. The sound quality is excellent as well with the music for the credit sequences coming through especially punchy, but the score throughout also having good balance in the mix.

Supplemental Materials

[Rating:0.5/5]

Nothing much here, but for this release with its danceable closing theme and rocking, off-kilter opening, both with cool animation, it really is a treat to have the clean versions.

• Clean Opening Animation
• Clean Closing Animation
• Sentai Filmworks Trailers
• Disc Credits

The Definitive Word

Overall:

[Rating:4/5]

Kill Me Baby is a series that will give you some great belly laughs, both from its writing and its clever animation style. The fast pace makes the thirteen episodes fly by and each of the characters truly stands out in their own right. Highly recommended.

Additional Screen Captures

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