Tonight, you will be viewing some extraordinary animation with awesome character designs, cool soundtracks, and gripping stories. The audience around you will be in awe, the clapping at the end will be deafening. You will be telling all your classmates this coming Monday about what you saw.

Unfortunately, Cat's Eye does not fall into this category. I am sorry, but this viewer found no redeeming qualities in this show. The only thing I can honestly tell you is that it is still better than Princess Army (which isn't saying much).

But alas, the above two paragraphs contain my sole opinion, so in order to let you decide for yourself, here are the facts. Cat's Eye was originally written by Tsukasa Hojo as manga (for you newbies, manga = Japanese comics). First published in 1981, the manga stretched for 18+ volumes. The anime spun off in 1983/84 and was directed by Yoshio Takeuchi.

The story revolves around three sisters: Ai, Hitomi, and Rui Kisugi. They run a cafe called "Cat's Eye" and are currently in search of their missing father. Their father, Michel Heinz, a German painter and art collector, disappeared a few years ago. The three sisters, looking for clues, start looking for the artpieces which once belonged to their father.

Unfortunately, the artpieces are now in the hands of "evil" art collectors. So guess what these girls decide to do?... yup, steal them. And what do they call themselves?... yup, Cat's Eye. But don't worry -- after a while, the police catches on and assigns a detective to the case, Toshio.

This is where it gets worse -- Toshio is a not-too-smart detective, who not only is incapable of catching Cat's Eye, but is dumb enough to talk about his failed attempts and new traps for Cat's Eye to his girlfriend Hitomi whenever he is drinking coffee at his favorite coffee shop, Cat's Eye.

It's no wonder that this series was canceled after barely completing its second season. I found it extremely predictable. It was like watching a badly done Three's Company or under-budget Pink Panther flick without the semi-humorous slapstick. The character designs seemed like they were based on extras from City Hunter with little or no thought taken to their roles in the story (i.e. When have you ever seen a police detective dressed like Toshio or cat burglars with roller skates as their "getaway car"?).

This is one title this e-board member will be voting against in future scheduling votes. In closing, I leave you with a quote from a person bored enough to devote a web page to this series: "Speaking for myself, it's still one of my favorite animes despite its age. I do believe, however, that it wouldn't have hurt if a few episodes had been left out."