Tattoon Master

—by Michael Poirier

One of the first things I noticed about TATOON MASTER is that the main character reminded me of Charlie Sheen—spiky haired and surly and unpleasant. Indeed, if that notoriously bad actor of cheesy action flicks and humorless comedies decided to make his own anime, perhaps this is the debacle that would ensue.
If you haven't guessed it already, I simply have nothing nice to say about this show. The animation is gruesomely sloppy. The writing is uninspired and the plot hackneyed. Supposedly a comedy, TATTOON MASTER is also painfully unfunny. Even the miserable fan service is more salacious and blatantly gratuituous as opposed to being even slightly cute or appealing.
The premise of TATOON MASTER is hardly original. Unfriendly teenager Eric finds himself bethrothed to a mysterious young woman named Balla who came to Japan from some undefined primitive tribe. Eric's mother left her family to learn more about "Tattoon power" of Balla's tribe, so she offered her own son in exchange for that knowledge. Now nasty little Eric has to deal with the affections of an improbably well-endowed girl with magical powers, as well as suffering through the usual hassles of high school.
Every character is thoroughly unlikeable: the self-pitying pornographer father, the greedy mother who abandoned her family, arrogant Eric, his perverted friends, ditzy Balla, their violent classmate Lisa, the misanthropic "enemy-of-the-week" Hydra and his manipulative mentor Kandar. Nevertheless, TATTOON MASTER kept trying to show a soft side to some of the characters, but it's the softness of something rotten, not something sweet. I despised each character so much, I couldn't even enjoy it when they kept trying to beat each other up.
It doesn't help that the dubbing comes across as insincere and delivered at an ear-splitting volume. Then again, that could be the fault of the juvenile script, since the characters usually only open their mouths to scream at one another.
TATTOON MASTER also shows a homophobic side that isn't very becoming either. Every time Eric rejects a girl, someone implies that he's gay and he reacts violently. Tomboy Lisa enjoys archery so even her grandfather thinks she's a lesbian. This kind of humor might have seemed appropriate twenty years ago in an episode of THREE'S COMPANY, but now it's just asinine and unwelcome.
The only thing I am grateful about in TATTOON MASTER is that it only deserves an "R" rating. There is a fair amount of semi-cursing ("freaking", etc.), and near-constant half-nudity. And while I don't profess to be an expert on "adult" anime, I kept getting the awful feeling that TATTOON MASTER was going to turn into one of those videos. This show offers all the insipid plot devices, shoddy animation and terrible acting of the most tawdry anime out there, if none of the explicit bits.
In the end, the only thing I can recommend about TATTOON MASTER is that it be left unviewed and unwanted in the dustbins of video stores nationwide. Right next to the moldy copies of Charlie Sheen's THE CHASE and NAVY SEALS.

Released in North America by A.D.Vision, Inc.
VHS, 60 minutes
Dubbed: VHSTM001/D
Available now in the USA
Where to buy