Alien 9

Frequently referred to as a hidden gem, Alien 9 is a coming of age story about a group of girls chosen to fight the aliens that pop up in their school. It lures you in with it's cute moe artstyle that's very distinctive to the era it was made in, but it quickly becomes disturbing. However.. I don't think there was that much to it.

The anime was cute and interesting but it left me with a lot of unanswered questions, although compared to everything else I think the anime has the highest rating. I was really itching to finish the story and so I moved on to the manga. The best way to describe it would be... incoherent. Not sure if my mind was drifting off someplace else while reading it but it seemed as if things were just happening without much sense and reason. The sequel, Alien 9: Emulators, seems to be the same way. Everything feels very mysterious and unsaid until the very end, and nothing really gets resolved or built upon properly. Maybe the panelling isn't really the best but I couldn't make sense of the story, even if I went back and reread some pages to get a better idea of what the fuck I'm reading. The motivations of all characters are left to be a mystery. What's up with the teachers? They were fighters before right? Why do we need to groom little girls to fight aliens? Nevermind it's over... The fight scenes were cool, and I did like the art sometimes.

Next is the allegorical part, which is eh. So the girls get chosen to become alien fighters, and to ultimately become merged/one with the alien. Adulthood, puberty, sexual/romantic partners, give and take, whatever. I think if the focus remained on just that the lore wouldn't have to be explained too deeply, but things kept getting introduced that meddled with the original concept to the point where I feel like the mangaka lost track of the allegorical points he was trying to make.

I recommend the anime if you want a quick slightly disturbing watch with more than a couple of really cool still shots a la evangelion...