As implied in the title, the year is 2808, and society is crime-wracked to the point where prisoners are offered the chance to join Oedo City's “Cyber Police" and earn commuted cyber-sentences should they cyber-snag enough high-level cyber-lawbreakers. There is, of course, a time-honored sci-fi catch: each of them is fitted with an explosive collar that can be detonated at any time by their emotionless superior, Hasegawa. Despite such a measure, the offer is quickly snatched up by three of the incarcerated. The cocky Sengoku Shunsuke approaches the job with a cynical amusement; the older, more sedate Gabimaru Rikuyu has a shady past and a cybernetic eye visor that earned him the nickname of “Goggles”; and the white-haired, highly effeminate Merill “Benten” Yanagawa (who resembles a j-rock singer) says little and wields a sharper-than-anything monowire line straight out of William Gibson's Johnny Mnemonic.

The first of Cyber City Oedo 808's three episodes is a showcase for Sengoku, who's called upon to investigate a hacker-hijacked skyscraper. The building's designer is cowering inside, convinced that his former co-worker is out to kill him. This sends the doubtful Sengoku on a hunt through the building and into a ridiculous, oddly satisfying showdown. The second episode reunites Goggles with his former partner in crime, Sara, who's a tribute to Cobra creator Buichi Terasawa's female characters if ever I saw one. She's also part of an insidious military project that pits an experimental cyborg death machine against ol' Goggles. The results are as shallow as the first episode, and just as visually striking.

If the first two episodes lack a certain spark, the third makes up for it. Auguring Kawajiri's superb Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust, the closing tale finds Benten investigating a series of murders committed by what seems to be a vampire, with clues leading to a mysterious young woman as well as an elderly billionaire who's in search of immortality. Kawajiri's in great form here, with a genuine mystery and a series of violent clashes that culminate in a fight atop a space elevator.

I confess to having a soft spot for the grim dystopias and bleak imagery of cyberpunk, even when they're used strictly as background. That's certainly the case in Cyber City Oedo 808, which is mostly an exercise in futuristic pulp storytelling, be it a tale of revenge from beyond the grave, a doublecross-laden thriller, or a vampire yarn. There's little in the way of the humans-and-technology motifs that characterize high-end science fiction, and there isn't much character detail either. Sengoku, Goggles, and Benten have barely enough personality to be likeable, and they're usually just puppets of the plot.

But I like facile quasi-cyberpunk, and I like Cyber City Oedo 808. It's charming in its own gritty little way, like an early-'90s videogame that somehow ended up as an anime series; it's already got a Final Fight clone's lineup of balanced guy, slow-yet-strong dude, and quick feminine fighter. (There is, in fact, at least one Oedo game for the PC Engine, but it's not a beat-'em-up.) The dank and gritty environs of the future Oedo are drawn in nice detail, and Kawajiri gives the action a visceral edge, never skimping on the overkill. Akinori Endo (Battle Angel) takes on a similar task by piling on storyline twists and unfiltered suspense, seldom giving viewers the time to notice that there isn't any real substance. Even the standard-issue upbeat opening song and depressing, synth-drenched ending theme are memorable.

Also comforting is the lack of Kawajiri's characteristic misogyny. His anime creations often show very nasty things happening to women, but Cyber City Oedo 808 presents little of this, content to merely stereotype them as either surreptitious femme fatales like Sara or naive cheerleaders like the freshly recruited officer Okyo Jounoichi. It's by no means a flattering point, but with Kawajiri it's refreshing enough when a woman survives an episode without getting a demon tentacle down her throat.

And while it's entertaining in subtitled form, the dubbed version is flat-out hysterical. The English script was revised to the point where some scenes are completely different; note the end of the first episode, wherein Sengoku is hunting yet another criminal in the Japanese version, but apparently plotting to kill his own boss in the dub. It's also stuffed with a ridiculous amount of swearing, so much so that the dub writers have Sengoku's R2-D2-like sidekick discuss the inaccuracies of saying “fuck” to a robot. Who says cartoons aren't educational?

Owning Cyber City Oedo 808 presents a few strange options: the original release, now out of print, puts all three episodes on one DVD with spotty audio in the first tale (though you also get a long and hilariously disjointed preview for the PC game Shadoan). Central Park Media later re-issued the series in three separate volumes, but the version to get is their later one-disc compilation, Cyber City: The Final Collection. It even includes commentary by Kawajiri and Madhouse founder Masao Maruyama. They mostly reminisce about making the series while dropping a few interesting details; for example, Maruyama wanted Benten to be a woman, but Kawajiri felt that the story wouldn't work with a female lead. Hmmmm.

Whether you take it as a slick piece of cyberpunk pulp or a laughably dubbed schlock-fest, Cyber City Oedo 808 has somehow weathered fifteen years more capably than Goku: Midnight Eye, Wicked City, Bio Hunter, Demon City Shinjuku, and a number of other Kawajiri-Madhouse offerings. It's not a classic of its era, but Cyber City Oedo 808 is still great trashy fun. And when it comes to Kawajiri, I couldn't ask for more.