MD Geist - 1986 OVA - Original Cut

MD Geist is a 1 episode OVA from 1986. There are two versions of this OVA, the original and the director's cut. While the 1996 director's cut is on DVD, the original 1986 version never made it sadly. It can only be bought subtitled on eroding copies on VHS or Laserdisc. So whats the big deal about the original cut? Well, with the diretor's cut they changed all the Japanese voice actors, sound effects and music placement. The director's cut couldn't be more different to the original version. Most contemporary fans have only seen the director's cut which is a real shame. Central Park Media also reanimated alot of scenes so in one frame you have standard 1986 character designs and then in another frame, you have mid 1996 designs, making chartacters and backgrounds look very out of place and superimposed. While MD Geist is more infamous than loved and deplored by alot of fan circles and critics, most fans of older anime shows from the 80's, especially those that love gritty, realistic one shot OVA's, will find MD Geist an absolute blast. While the original cut has a few animation errors, who cares? So do most shows from this decade, try and find one tv series that doesn't have some minor animation issues or mistakes here and there. I actually like seeing the odd mistake here and there, it's those inperfections in cel animation that keep the obsessive fans coming back.

MD Geist is set in a post apocolopytic wasteland, on a far way planet called Jerra. A lot of the early landscape shots are reminscent to the show Fist of the North Star, perhaps a few animators of this OVA were long time fans. MD Geist is an ex soldier who has been freed from an orbital sattelite prison and now looks to explore his surroundings. MD Geist is an enigma to anyone who meets him. Is he good or bad? Who are his allies or enemies on this strange planet? There are so many questions to be answered so don't worry if you can't figure out what's going on right away, the plot is actually quite layered and it unwraps a little bit more with each new scene. There are some pretty cool dramatic scene fades in this OVA. The music is your standard synthesiser soundtrack, although with a jazzy twist, listen for the trumpets! It makes fantastic listening and MD Geist actually has a pretty awesome soundtrack which kicks in well with the action scenes and intensifys the build up of atmosphere in the earlier scenes especially. Because it's 1986, expect a fair bit of violence and a raunchy scene here and there, as main characters get aquainted. There is also a lot of cool Mecha designs in this anime, I particularly like the brain controlled red robot.

This ACR encode of the original cut is taken from the the subtitled 1992 Laserdisc release. Almost all other versions on other sites are inferior VHS rips which have muted colours, grain and tin can audio quality. I encoded this and tried to go for DVD like video quality and I think I achieved it. I did this rip back in 2009 and I always meant to post it here on this site. Enjoy! Now you can tell your friends you've seen the real MD Geist.

MD Geist - Download Here

Overall Grade/Rating: A
Commercial Availability: VHS (Japan), Laserdisc (Japan)