El-Hazard is a comedy among comedies, among animes. This light hearted series takes the mind into a beautiful dimension, with dangerous perils, warring nations, and....cross-dressing! Enter Makoto Mizuhara: An average Japanese high school student, who views himself as nothing special. Of course "nothing special" is the exact opposite of how he's viewed by Katsuhiko Jinnai. Jinnai: a psychotic, insane, hysterical, jealous, and violent person. His hyena like cackle is so comical that no matter the circumstance, you'll laugh upon hearing it. Although Makoto doesn't know it, he is Jinnai's "arch-rival" and "enemy" especially when they both run for school president.
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Things happen, and Jinnai chases Makoto around, until time seems to freeze and Makoto can escape to ancient ruins, just discovered under the school. Eventually, he meets a strange lady who transports him to another dimension, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah, he is surrounded by an evil race of bug like monsters with his teacher, Masamichi Fujisawa (personally my favorite character); an alcoholic, smoking, martial arts expert. Mr. Fujisawa discovers the dimensional shift has given him powers and with his ultimate "Fujisawa Monster Kick!" he is able to ward them off until people rescue him.
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Now this isn't a summary, so I'll wrap things up, and explain the overall plot (plus, I don't want to spoil this spectacular series). Makoto has to dress like Princess Fatora, who coincidentally looks just like him. She had just been kidnapped, so they need to trick a council to be able to use a powerful weapon to destroy the Bugram (the bug monsters). Then they have to find priestesses (a hilarious, and kick-ass group of awesome girls) to activate the weapon. Meantime Jinnai seems to have developed the ability to speak the Bugram and becomes their co-leader. He discovers a Demon-Goddess Ifurita who he uses to attack the inhabitants of El-Hazard (this other dimension). Also, a race of shadow like people have kidnapped Fatora, and once she is rescued, you're immediately sorry, because she is one of the meanest characters I've ever seen (even worse than Asuka and Narusegawa, if you think it is possible).
This is the basic plot, but that is not the best aspect of this series. The extraordinary coloring and beautiful artwork makes this a great series to see, and the hilarious lesbian and cross-dressing side-plot lines make you fall out of whatever you're sitting on, laughing. The ending has a nice romance, and the characters are some of the best group ever. I highly recommend this superb series, which surprisingly, and dissapointingly is not too long. It is 4 VHS's with 45-60 minutes each. Out of the many animes I've seen, this is actually tied for my favorite!!!
Episodes: 4, of approx. 45-60 minutes each.
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