DVD Review: Yo-Yo Girl Cop
Okay, so take a hot young girl with a bad attitude, put her in a sexy short-skirted school uniform, give her a yo-yo that straps into a yo-ho holster attached to her leg, and now you've got something to watch! If only the plot were a bit more interesting, then this could be a great film. I dunno, maybe I'm dumb or something, but I just couldn't quite follow what was going on. It just didn't make sense to me; it didn't seem logical. I know this is based on an old movie/TV/comic franchise, but I don't really think my confusion stems from not having seen any previous incarnations of Yo-Yo Girl Cop.
The movie starts cryptic enough, with what appears to be a high school girl stupering around Japanese intersection busy with pedestrians coming and going. This in itself would probably not seem odd, except that this particular girl seems to have a bomb strapped to her chest. She looks stunned and dazed, and then as the beeping on the bomb gets quicker, she starts yelling at people to get away from her. Uh... hello? Aren't you the one that walked into the crowded streets? If you want don't want to hurt these people, which is what it is seeming like, then why don't you just use your legs and leave? Or better yet, TAKE THE BOMB OFF! But nope, and so she goes BOOOOM!!!
Now we're in New York. And yes, that's the New York in the United States. As far as I know, Japan doesn't have any place called New York. So the deal here is that the daughter of the original Yo-Yo Girl Cop, now 17 years of age, has just been detained for causing an incident after her mother was arrested. A detective from Japan tells her that her mom is facing charges as a spy, and could end up spending a lot of time in jail... but there's a way out (isn't there always?). Just agree to go undercover as a student in Seisen High School and uncover the mystery behind the Enola Gay website... which is what their previous agent was investigating before she blew herself up... yep, that stupid girl in the previous paragraph was a COP!
As you'd probably expect, she declines the offer... but then recants and accepts. So she gets all dressed up in her sexy school girl uniform and is given the alias Saki Asamiya. Now she must somehow make contacts in school that will aid her in figuring out what the timer on the website is counting down to. So the first thing she does when being introduced to the class is to tell them all to shut up or she'll hurt them... alright, interesting strategy. The first girl she really meets is one who is constantly bullied by a group of evil high school chicks. And when I say bullied, I don't mean the give-me-your-lunch-money type of bullying, I mean the throw-buckets-of-dirty-mop-water-all-over-her and the throw-her-desk-and-all-her-books-out-of-the-second-story-window type of bullying. It's like holy crap, where are the teachers during all this?!
That kind of bullying needs to be reported. If the teachers won't listen, then go to the police. File a lawsuit. Do something! That's not the kind of bullying you can just brush off. That's causing property damage and actually endangering the public health. But no, she just takes it, and when Saki witnesses it first hand, she doesn't even report it either. She just goes and tells the girls to stop. And when they laugh at her, she ends up beating the crap out all the guys that were hanging around ready to defend their evil mistresses. And I have to say, none of the fight scenes were really that good. It was obvious she never actually made physical contact with anyone she was fighting. I know you're not supposed to when filming it, but you can at least get within a few inches and slow your limb after it is supposed to have made contact.
I suppose I should get to some yo-yo stuff, since the thing is called Yo-Yo Girl Cop. The first time she uses her yo-yo, it falls flat on the ground and doesn't return to her hand. The second time, she whacks herself in the head. It was a funny scene, but did anyone ever even teach her to use the thing? Sure doesn't seem like it from this, but then after like only two yo-yo scenes later and she uses it like an expert. There wasn't a montage or anything showing precisely how she got that good at using a device that she was pretty much fumbling with earlier on.
Anyway, back to the plot. Some more students try to blow themselves up, and Saki has no idea why... and neither do I. It seems to be about wanting to do something big... and I think that Romeo (who is the main dude who chats on the website) somehow convinces them to blow themselves up, but I just don't get how. If you're a person who is being tortured by bullies, and you're convinced by someone that the only thing you can do to make it end is to strike back... then wouldn't you strike back at the people bullying you? Why would you strap on a bomb and blow up innocent people on the streets and in the mall, leaving the bullies free to continue harassing others?
So I thought that part of the story wasn't very well thought out, and then as it got to the end it got even more confusing. The girl who was bullied and the girls who were bullying her are now buddies? And the girls who were bullying people want to be blown up, as do a whole room filled with people? What the heck? Did I miss some part where they drugged everybody making then totally insane? Also toward the end of the film, Saki puts on the cool-looking body-hugging leather suit, though I've no idea where it came from. It must have been one warn by the original Yo-Yo Girl Cop. It just would have been nice if we could have seen it being handed down to her.
All-in-all, it was enjoyable to look at, but was hard to become sympathetic for any of these characters because most of them just seemed so dumb, and the fight scene were too phony. Yo-Yo Girl Cop releases on July 17, 2007 by Magnolia Pictures.
