Ah! My Goddess, also known as Oh! My Goddess, is a manga (and later an anime) about a student named Keiichi whose domestic arrangements include a goddess named Belldandy and her sisters Urd and Skuld, also goddesses.

A spin-off manga is The Adventures of the Mini-Goddesses, about the adventures which the three goddesses have when Keiichi is out of the house and they shrink themselves down to rat-size to play with Gan, a rat who is the fifth resident of their house. This spin-off has also been turned into an anime. The Adventures of Mini-Goddess: the Gan-Chan Files is the first of four DVD releases of The Adventures of Mini-Goddess. The other three releases are:

• Volume 2: The Belldandy Files
• Volume 3: The Urd Files
• Volume 4: The Skuld Files

As you can tell from the titles, each volume is a collection of episodes centering on a particular character. There are 12 episodes on each DVD, and each DVD has a running time of just 100 minutes, so each episode is fairly short.

In the Gan-Chan Files, Gan is the focus of each episode on the DVD. Gan is a rat with a good sense of humor, because he is often the butt of jokes by Urd and Skuld. In the first episode, Urd marries him off to a teapot, and in a later episode in which he wishes to visit outer space, Urd and Skuld send him first to the moon and then into deep space, obviously further than he had planned to travel.

Belldandy doesn't appear for very long in these episodes, making short but cute cameo appearances. At the end of one episode, she shyly appears on the screen to say, "I wish that I could have been a part of this episode."

Each short episode is cute and entertaining - perfect for short attention spans or younger viewers. Older viewers and those not familiar with Ah! My Goddess might not find the episodes to be as cute or as entertaining.

Classic monster fans will appreciate the "Gabira" episodes: after eating moldy food, Gan transforms into a large moldy monster. Urd names the monster "Gabira, code name G." (Gan's second transformation on this DVD gets him the code name "G2.")

In the last episode, Gan is finally not the butt of a joke. Urd and Skuld have challenged each other to a game of baseball, which is possible for goddesses who can "multiply" and have copies of themselves be in different places at the same time. Gan and Belldandy are the announcers for the game, with Belldandy playing the straight man for Gan's baseball jokes.

The extras on this DVD include two pages/screens of character notes about Belldandy, a Belldandy art gallery with 13 color images, DVD credits, and choice of English or Japanese language audio. The English subtitles on the Japanese audio version can be turned off. The insert duplicates the DVD cover art on one side, with a fold-out mini-poster of Gan on the other side.

Rating: 13 UP
Running Time: 100 minutes
Distributor:  Pioneer Entertainment (USA)
English-language web site: http://www.pioneeranimation.com/amg/index.html
Suggested retail price: $29.98 USD