City Hunter is an anime I should, by all rights, really enjoy. It's part of that 80s era of anime that I positively adore, with all the style and visual charm you would expect from that time period. And beyond that it's got some premium music (that would likely be classified as "City Pop" on a variety of YouTube playlists). The vibes of the whole program, on the surface, really feel like something that would easily fill the void after another re-watch of Dirty Pair.
But every time I try to watch it, I just bounce off it immediately. Well, maybe not immediately. I usually watch the intro and get pulled in by the music and visuals. It's not an all time top-tier intro, but it's still pretty good! But even in the intro, I get to see parts of the show that just sour me quickly on the whole property.
Obviously City Hunter is a product of a bygone era, a television program (and manga) made for mid-80s Japan, and not for a silly cartoon vixen genie in the year 2023.
But holy shit is the main protagonist a creep. The main thrust of the series is that Ryo Saeba, gun for hire, is an extremely talented and dependable professional - who acts in the least professional manner possible. And by that I mean that he's constantly acting like an annoying horn-dog who has no concept of limits or boundaries. It's not that Ryo is an expert who sometimes says a few problematic things, either. Something akin to 90% of his character is borderline sexual assault, or at the very least, violating some girl's privacy.
The show plays this off as him being a good natured goofus who comes through when the chips are down. Like, yeah, he'll go through your laundry and steal your panties, make constant passes at you, cop a feel, etc., but he shoots the bad guys real good! The intention reads something like, "He's a pervert with a heart of gold". But that's super hard to take seriously when the vast majority of his time is doing the nonconsensual pervert stuff*.
Again, it's not the yardstick by which to measure this series. It's nearly 40 years old at this point, from a very different time and culture. I'm not trying to condemn it, just trying to brain dump about why I keep bouncing right off it every single time I try to watch it. It just leaves me feeling... gross.
I should just rewatch Dirty Pair again.
*Full disclosure: I am fully and totally in support of pervert stuff, so long as all parties involved give thorough, full, and continuous enthusiastic consent.
