Young Mint Clark, eight years old and as precocious as hell, has been brought to the the Howard Resort Casino by her multimillionaire grandfather. Mint isn't all that impressed with the gaming, but she's heard rumours that the casino boats a rather unusual member of staff: Rio, the so-called "Goddess of Victory" who's a lucky charm for anyone fortunate enough to be playing at her table. That luck turns out to be something that Mint is going to need, too, when gambler Orlin Dunhill takes a shine to her teddy bear, Choco, forcing Rio to play poker on Mint's behalf to make sure she can keep her precious bear... This is one of those shows where it would have been great to sit in on the production meetings, preferably with a clue-by-four or other large, heavy object that could have been used to beat some sense into the people making it. Either that, or sit there with a sandwich board reading "What the fuck are you thinking?!" in a silent protest. Rio - Rainbow Gate! is the ill-thought-out child of a deal between anime production company XEBEC and game manufacturer Tecmo to market characters used in their games. Rio has appeared in the Dead or Alive series of fighting games, but seems to be better known for appearances on pachinko machines - so it's no surprise that gambling should be the subject of choice for her series. The thing is, there are 1,001 things I can think of that would make a good series set in a casino - but XEBEC have gone for the fanservice approach, putting Rio in a series of outfits that make her look more like a cosplayer than a casino worker and making it very clear that T&A is going to take priority over any semblance of story. Mint's grandfather? A bastard for taking her to a casino and then leaving her to her own devices (she's 8, fer chrissake). Orlin? What sort of bastard tries to steal a child's teddy bear? And then expects her to play poker for it when that doesn't work? The casino owner? A bastard for treating Rio as meat and an object of titillation - slap a harassment suit on him, quick. Rio? She's lovely, it's true - but when her role in life seems to be to make the punters win and her employers lose, big, you have to wonder why she's still in employment (oh, yeah, she has nice tits. Almost forgot about that.). Am I taking this too seriously? Probably. But when what laughably passes for plot in this opening episode is as nonsensical and pointless as what we have here, I've got time to think of other things and work up a raaaage, and for that I make no apology. The Good: Nice tits. And to be fair, the fanservice isn't as OTT as many recent shows, as witnessed by the lack of any lensflare / steam / other editing tricks. Production values seem quite high, too. The Bad: Just about everything else. Were it not for my being almost obsessive about finishing what I've started, Rio - Rainbow Gate! would be tossed to one side, very quickly. It's got a lot of work to do in its next few episodes if it's to build itself into something entertaining, because at the moment it's anything but.
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