So, over the last couple decades, Street Fighter: The Animated Series (the American series which aired on USA Network from 1995-1997) has been seen as the butt of many jokes, and in fairness a lot of those are deserved. Some have called the series an abomination. But it’s best not to approach it as a serious adaptation but as a completely ridiculous ride. To that end, the show succeeds in flying colors.

For those not aware, the show’s a weird amalgamation of the live action Jean Claude Van Damme movie, the original 1991 video game and its sequels, and whatever original material the writers came up with. So we have Guile as a leader of an anti-crime fighting unit (consisting of himself, along with rotating participations of Chun-Li, Blanka, Ryu and Ken, Dee Jay, T. Hawk and E. Honda), which is somewhat similar to the movie, and Colonel Sawada from the film appears in a couple outings. But unlike the movie which took liberties with the character outfits, everyone here is wearing their signature fighting outfits (amusingly, they seem to wear them even in situations that wouldn’t be logical). And some aspects seem to differ from BOTH the games and the movie, like Guile having a former love interest named Lucinda instead of his wife Julia and daughter Chris from the games. There’s also Guile’s no-nonsense boss Escher, another exclusive character, who gives him the various missions. And Cammy’s teammates from Delta Red, who are only briefly featured in the ending cutscene of Super Street Fighter II, are fleshed out a bit more here.

The stories, a few penned by DC and Marvel alumni, are actually pretty decent, even if they lean heavily towards G.I. Joe-esque plots that don’t always mesh with the Street Fighter games’ tones. For instance, one plot involves a dictator pulling a false flag operation that Guile has to get to the bottom of; another has Guile rescuing a boy from an embassy which is under attack by Sagat’s forces. While a couple plot threads are followed up on in later episodes (Blanka’s girlfriend Mai-Lei; T. Hawk’s former lover-turned terrorist Satin Hammer), the more meaty stories came during season 2, as they introduced two recurring story arcs: Cammy is revealed to be a sleeper agent for Bison and defects; and Blanka is exposed to experimental mutagen that causes him to become doubly powerful but also out-of-control, slightly amnesic, and full of rage. Both of these plots gets a few episodes each. In addition, they introduced a few Alpha-era characters like Sakura, Rolento and Rose, which in hindsight was pretty impressive as the Alpha games were brand new at the time.

And the Guile-heavy plots in season 1 are toned down a bit in favor of more Ryu/Ken plots (in season 1 they were largely comic relief side characters). In fact, some of my favorite storylines involved Ryu and Ken, mainly for their clashing personalities; as in the games, Ryu is the serious, studious warrior while Ken is the skillful but cocky show-off. In “So, You Want to Be in Pictures”, Ken gets to produce one of Fei-Long’s films, which naturally goes to his already inflated head. “Final Fight” is a fan favorite that crosses over the Street Fighter and Final Fight universes; even though it’s lame that Haggar doesn’t join the battle, it still is an acceptable retelling of the story. And “World’s Greatest Warrior” has Ken facing off against the ridiculously powerful Akuma, while Ryu recovers from an injury.

But perhaps my favorite episode has to be season 1’s “The Medium is the Message”, where a typical fighting tournament goes awry as Bison tries to kill the Street Fighters with some bulky mutant fighters, and when that plan fails, he shows the stadium crowd a deepfake video of the Street Fighters desecrating a sacred temple to rile them up and cause a riot. Such a plot was ahead of its time, since this technology is now commonplace, and of course this episode contains two of the show’s most popular memes. It’s also one of the few episodes where tournament fighting is a big part of it, rather than just a throwaway scene before the team gets their next mission.

Whenever the show’s discussed, it’s inevitable to bring up its animation quality, or lack thereof. It started out being animated at famed anime studio Madhouse, though you wouldn’t know it; it looks and moves less like, say, Ninja Scroll or Black Lagoon, and more like a typical action cartoon of the time (read: not Batman: The Animated Series, which was an exceptional action cartoon of the time). Wasted potential, really. Towards the end of season 1, and for all of season 2, animation duties were switched to Sunrise, though again, it’s debatable how much Sunrise’s original Japanese studio actually worked on it. Based on the Chinese names in the credits, it can be assumed that the majority of the work was actually done by Sunrise’s Shenzhen studio, and while there are occasionally glimpses of anime-esque animation, most of it feels very janky, with varying line qualities, odd movements, and fluctuating character models. One of the most famous animation errors is one scene where Dee Jay exits an elevator but, due to the weird perspective, appears to shrink to half the size of a gun-firing mook near him. But again, this results in many memes and memorable moments (even if for the wrong reasons), so silver lining. And at least the intro animation looks pretty good.

On the other hand, the casting and voice acting by Ocean Group is superb. It helps that this was the first Street Fighter property I ever saw in animated form, but to me, Richard Newman is the definitive M. Bison voice. He hams it up big time, and lines “Yes, yes, I killed your father. I killed my father too, and you don’t hear ME whining about it!” are hilarious with how he delivers them. Same for Guile, voiced by Michael Donovan in one of his best macho voices; his voice is who I first think of when I think of Guile. Scott McNeil voices both Blanka and Ken, two very different characters, showcasing his amazing range. Ken’s ego in particular comes across so well thanks to McNeil’s deliveries. Paul Dobson also does heavy lifting by playing (deep breath) Dee Jay, E. Honda, Vega, T. Hawk, Fei Long, AND Balrog, giving different accents to each. I also enjoyed Lisa Ann Beley’s British accent for Cammy, and on the opposite end of the spectrum, Donna Yamamoto as Chun-Li deserves special mention for not doing a cringey stereotypical Chinese accent but instead just voicing her in her usual speaking voice.

Another enjoyable aspect of the show is the rock-flavored soundtrack by Andrew Dimitroff, which gets you pumped up for some action. The Street Fighter theme is rearranged in a few ways throughout (including for the opening sequence), although it would’ve been nice if they had adapted other game tracks for the show. Can you imagine how fun it would’ve been had Guile’s patriotic anthem been given the electric guitar treatment? Other music is synthesized orchestral, and works well enough- I always enjoyed the staccato notes and military drums in the “mission” theme when Escher briefs Guile on his next assignment. And of course, who could forget the melodramatic “dun dun dun dun!” music when, for example, Guile watches Cammy get away with Bison, or Johann Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor” rearranged into a techno beat? The latter two only enhance the memes.

And speaking of: There are so many moments in this show that make you ask “Why?”. Why do flames randomly shoot up behind Guile as he shouts “BISON!”? Why is Balrog typing with boxing gloves on? Why is Bison rolling down a subway track while electrified? Why does Damnd purposefully electrocute himself? Why, during a building fire, does a random hook appear from the smoke and grab someone whom we never see again? Why are a group of mooks suddenly drawn as literal bowling pins when Blanka does his rolling attack on them? Why does Sagat ask Guile if he wants some Corn Flakes? Why does a Shoryuken from Ryu “scar” Sagat but there’s no blood, and it just instantaneously pinks his skin? Why would a Sonic Boom from Guile disarm a bomb? Why is T. Hawk able to fly? Why is Guile able to backflip himself up out of a volcano interior? Why does Escher go through so much trouble to craft different cryptic ways to summon Guile to his office for his next mission rather than just a phone call? Why did the animators decide to draw gibberish morphing shapes on E. Honda’s computer screen instead of something resembling what a real desktop would look like? Why is Sagat so pleased with himself that he caught a fish in the process of retrieving a sunken orb? (see above pic) I could go on and on, but hopefully this gives you a small sampling of the insanity found in this show. But it’s not meant to be a comedic show; the show largely tries to be serious, but has so many odd moments that come out of nowhere. It’s the kind of insanity that sneaks up on you.

This new single disc Blu-ray release is still in standard definition, but it is a worthy upgrade from the DVD set released a couple years ago. For starters, there is commentary on every single episode, spearheaded by YouTuber Matt McMuscles with a revolving door of co-hosts. While the tracks aren’t always the wealth of information you would hope and tend to succumb to the duo just laughing at whatever madness is happening on-screen, Matt does throw out some factoids now and then to keep it at least a little educational. Just the fact that he recorded 26 of these tracks, though, is pretty impressive and honestly worth the re-buy alone. Also on the set are the original storyboards for the opening sequence side-by-side with the final version (honestly one of the most interesting bonuses), and… what may be a first for special features: A YouTube Poop of the show. Yes, one of the YTPs from the late ‘00s was re-assembled using better footage, shuffled around clips, and a few edits. I never thought I’d live to see the day that such a thing would be on an official release, but considering the Discotek crew leaned hard into the memetic nature of the show with the choice of screenshots on the back (incredible shrinking Dee Jay!/Bison’s ”YES! YES!”), it honestly fits the release like a glove.

All right, so Street Fighter won’t win any awards for being a faithful adaptation of the source material, nor does it have the artistic/dramatic achievements that the 1994 anime film did. But if you want a show that will make you go “WTF?!”, Street Fighter will give that to you in spades. It’s meme central, and I will guarantee you will never be bored watching it.

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