10 Underrated 1990s Anime You Probably Haven't Seen

In the late nineties Armitage: Polymatrix was lauded as the epitome of adult-oriented anime. It was shown during primetime on the Sci-Fi channel, the lead characters were voiced by Elizabeth Berkley and Kiefer Sutherland. The movie, likely, made very little sense to you if you watched it as well. So why is a film that made no sense during a prime-time run on this list?

The real Armitage was a four-episode OVA with a run-time of over two hours, with the first episode, alone, being 45 minutes. The western version was turned into a film, called Armitage III: Polymatrix, with a run-time of only 90 minutes. More than an entire episode was cut from the film, causing a disruption to the pacing and taking away huge pieces of the story.

Aside from that, the casting of Berkley and Sutherland in roles that had already been recorded by more experienced voice actors was a strange attempt at appealing to western audiences. (In all honesty Berkley and Sutherland didn't do a bad job, either - though neither were they fantastic.)

Adding to the myriad of reasons many may not have seen the real Armitage is the strange format to the series' titles. Armitage III is the original four-episode series - Armitage III: Polymatrix is the American film version, and Armitage: Dual-Matrix is the sequel film that came out seven years later. Confusing, right?