For someone who’s read the source material, it’s hard to look at an adaptation objectively — even if you’re not trying to, you’ll always think about how it differs and measures up the source material.

And let me tell you, this ain’t it chief.

I’ll only compare the OVA to the manga briefly, because as futile as it is, I try reviewing works themselves, without considering their relation to other creations. For one, it doesn’t really capture the tone of the manga. The comedy that was sparse in the manga is cranked up to eleven. It’s funny, yes, but not very accurate. Compressing a 33-chapter manga into a ~50 minute OVA means that many characters are cut out and only a portion of the story is shown — a revised beginning and a slightly altered section from roughly the middle of the story. The stakes on paper are high, but in practice very low. If you wanted an alternate take on the story, then by all means watch, but it is in no way superior to the manga.

Outlanders is the story of Tetsuya, a newspaper photographer who runs into an alien named Kahm. After encountering him, Kahm decides she wants Tetsuya as a fiancee.

There’s not much to it, which is natural, given the short run-time. The romance (if you can even call it that) doesn’t have any time to develop and Kahm then Tetsuya is inexplicably enamored with the other member. The OVA exacerbates the biggest problem of the manga — the lackluster romance. In addition, it does away with its biggest strength: the drama. There’s talk of an alien invasion, but it effectively doesn’t exist. There’s no sense of adventure. The little action that remains is quite gory, with no payoff. The violent scenes are never mentioned again and achieve no purpose other than giving the anime a bit of an identity crisis.

The animation looks pretty enough.

The way I recommend you watch Outlanders is to stick your finger in your ear, find the switch inside your head, and turn your brain off. If Outlanders is good at one thing it’s comedy. There were times when I was legitimately laughing and the irreverent tone helps with this. It helps that in the English dub, Sean Schemmel of Dragon Ball fame plays Tetsuya and gives quite an animated performance. If you like a bit of crude humor, then Outlanders will be up your alley.

Still, as funny as it can be at times, the anime still isn’t that great. It’s less than an hour, so if you want a dumb comedy and don’t have a lot of time to invest, then you should check out Outlanders. Just don’t expect anything great out of it, though.

The insert song’s pretty cool, though.

6/10