Dominion: Tank Police

Dominion: Tank Police is a manga series written and drawn by Masamune Shirow, and later adapted into two OVA series: Dominion Tank Police, which came first, and New Dominion Tank Police. Set in the fictional city of Newport, Japan, in a future in which bacterial air pollution has become so severe that people must wear gas masks when outdoors, the series follows a police squadron that uses tanks.

The original manga was published by Hakusensha, Kodansha and later by Seishinsha. The first OVA series, Dominion Tank Police, was produced by Agent 21, being released in 1988, while the sequel, New Dominion Tank Police, was released between 1992-1993 by J.C.STAFF and Bandai Visual.

The manga has been published in English by Dark Horse Comics. The anime has been released in English translation in the United Kingdom by Manga Video and in the United States by Central Park Media, under their US Manga Corps division.

Shirow has also produced a sequel to the original series, entitled Dominion Conflict One: No More Noise.

The Japanese titles for the manga are "Dominion" and "Dominion: Conflict".

The OAV was, in many ways, a total rewrite of the manga, rather than an adaption, as there is very little in common between the two, other than the characters themselves - who did not escape having their personalities adjusted abit to suit the OAV's far lighter plot.

The Tank Police

 * Leona Ozaki : A young female officer in the Tank Police. Extremely enthusiastic about her work, and obsessively protective of her tank, which she calls "Bonaparte".


 * Originally, Leona was an officer in the motorcycle division before requesting a transfer to the Tank Police.


 * Al Cu Ad Solte : A young male officer, Leona's much calmer partner and co-pilot of Bonaparte. He is very taken by Leona but is always second in her affections ahead of Bonaparte.  He also is a very good computer hacker.


 * Charles Britain (Also Charles Brenten) : Leona's squad leader. Very macho, with little regard for regulations or the health, safety and property of civilians. He also is the best shot in the force, preferring a large, old-fashioned revolver (which he lovingly refers to as "the Castigator") to the automatic weapons used by other members of his unit. He also has a lifetime subscription to "How to Kill" Magazine.


 * Chaplain : An unofficial police chaplain and tank pilot. Once took pity on a criminal, who then shot and killed his partner and escaped.


 * Jim E. Lovelock (Specs, Megane or Four-Eyes) : A scientific expert and tank commander. His knowledge and insights are often helpful on difficult cases and his calm and logical thinking are a blessing in crisis situations. He has a friendly rivalry with Chaplain.


 * Chief : The chief of police. Prone to tearing out what little hair he has left... and what's left over turned white due to the stress of the job. He also has a chronic ulcer that always acts up whenever the Tank Police cause too much collateral damage. In arguments with the previous mayor, he comments in the introduction that tanks are insufficient for keeping the peace, and would prefer 'replacing our guns with tactical nuclear weapons,' though it's unclear if he means this to be taken seriously.


 * Charlie Nam : Britain's weapons officer in New Dominion.


 * Sophie Tucker : The chief's pretty, bright-spirited aide in New Dominion, who is often looking for Britain for the morning reports.

Criminals

 * Buaku : The "super criminal" the Tank Police was formed to fight, specializing in bank robbery and general mayhem. He leads a gang, but appears to be backed by unknown individuals. Buaku's true origins are unclear between the OVA and the Manga itself.  In the OVA, Buaku was apparently a "test dummy" for the Greenpeace Crolis project, who escaped destruction when government agents raided the lab and destroyed everything except for encoded data disguised as a nude portrait of himself.  He ends up living on the streets and is eventually framed for a bank robbery by an unidentified woman and later arrested by police...which starts the chain of events that led him to become a criminal.  In the Manga, it is said that Buaku started his criminal career over 80 years ago in Argentina.


 * In the first OVA his goal is to retrieve urine samples for a mysterious go-between for the unseen crime boss "Mr. Big". The Tank Police thwarted his plans, but are unable to arrest him.


 * In the second OVA he tried to retrieve the encoded data from the Greenpeace experiment, which is on display at a local auction house in Newport. In the Manga, his final criminal act is the theft of the Space Colony "Embryo", in which he succeeds and escapes to the stars with his gang, with the exception of the Puma Sisters, who were left on Earth to organize the final getaway.


 * Anna Puma and Uni Puma :



Anna & Uni are a pair of tall, beautiful android catgirls who were created as "love dolls" to be marketed for profit, but they developed beyond this superficial programming and became criminals, joining forces with Buaku. After Buaku disappears, they wander about aimlessly doing odd jobs for anyone who can pay them. Except for the occasional spat, they are inseparable and sisterly in the most extreme ways. They despise the series' heroine Leona Ozaki, and the feeling is mutual.

Uni is the original, and Anna is in fact cloned from her.

In the first anime series, they have blonde hair, but in the second anime&mdash;New Dominion Tank Police&mdash;they have red hair.

In the Sequel 'No More Noise' the Puma Twins join the Tank Police. Understandably Leona objects, but the chief points out that, as Androids, they're not responsible for thier actions and therefore can't be held criminally liable.

Interestingly, for all that they were created as sex dolls, they are vastly superior to humans in terms of strength, agility, speed and ability to take damage. They also have what seems to be the equivalent of military-gade targetting computers. The oddest trait of heir construction is that much of their large size is optional. They have the ability to shrink to child-size by expelling large amounts of water. This is revealed when it's discovered their normal size is too big to effectively pilot the tanks. Many of these traits don't come into play much (or at all) in the OAV, but are all present in the manga.

They also have a cameo in the Manga version of Ghost in the Shell, where they are selling black market robotic mods and subsequently get robbed by a Tachikoma.

Others

 * Greenpeace Crolis : A mysterious green-skinned girl with wings, kidnapped from the Critical Science Development Agency by the Buaku Gang. She was originally developed to counteract the bacteria-laden smog that covers the Earth:  a humanoid "air purifier".  Although she's constantly in the company of Buaku and his gang, she couldn't really care less about their motives... as long as she's in a place with plenty of light.  Annapuma and Unipuma are constantly left caring for her.


 * Critical Science Development Agency : A scientific research institution and think tank. They first show up to try and recover Greenpeace Crolis from the police, with little success.  Later, Specs joins them after they finally accept his application for employment, only to return when he finds out they only wanted to steal his research and put their name on it.


 * Citizens Against Destructive Police (CADP) : A group of citizen activists who oppose the Tank Police. They are led by a woman who is only known as the "District Prosecutor."  She only shows up in Dominion Part 1 with the unveiling of the T4-F tank and in one of Leona's nightmares in "Phantom of the Audience."

Anime vs Manga
It should be noted that the OAV and Manga series were radically different, both in terms of plot and general feel. The most immediately obvious difference between the OAVs and the Manga is in the tanks. In the OAVs, most of the police use full-sized tanks, with only Leona's tank being small. The tanks are meant to be urban combat vehicles, and are, in essence, the Dominion equivalent of powered armor, the large size used in the OAVs is totally impractical. The tank design used for bonaparte in the OAVs is, in the original manga, the standard-issue vehicle.

As of autumn 2006, there is now a TV series airing in Japan named "Keisatsu Sensha Tai S.W.A.T.". It is either based on, or follows, the Conflict manga, and is far more accurate to the manga than the OAVs. As it begins in or around the Conflict arc, the 'pumas begin as members of the police department. Unlike in the manga, however, it seems that they don't need to shrink down in order to fit into the driver's section of the tanks.