Let’s Watch is a weekly recap column where I follow an anime for the course of its entire runtime. Expect spoilers!
Or: The one where things start getting kinda nuts.
Remember Shindler? The weird wannabe authoritarian we were introduced to a few weeks ago? takt op.Destiny certainly does, because he and his Musicart Hell return here, and in spectacularly awful fashion. But getting to the heart of why his return here is impactful requires us to talk about the rest of the episode first. “Truth -Noise-” is in fact, aside from its sharp turn in its final few minutes, otherwise another fairly sedate and character-driven episode.
The focus here, as it often is, is on our leads and their relationship to each other, which takes on a few new dimensions here as the trio roll into a town somewhere in the Appalachians that has been recently beset by D2s.
A few things happen here. Takt is wrapped up in attempts to compose a song since last week’s episode, and relentless mental improvisation (combined with his habit of tapping out the notes he’s “playing” in his head) have left him exhausted.
Takt, seen here looking like every college student I’ve ever known.
Destiny and Anna’s relationship has been somewhat strained by the latter being unwilling to let go of the idea that Destiny somehow still “is” Cosette (and in her defense it’s possible she’s right. We don’t really know enough about the mechanics of how Musicarts awaken. Either way, it’s clear Destiny doesn’t like it.)
Destiny and Takt’s relationship, meanwhile, feels like it’s opening up. When Takt gets ahold of an instrument this episode (a melodica, of all things, rather than the pianos he’s used to), it turns out to be because Destiny borrowed it from someone. It’s clear the two care about each other even if they’re not very good at showing it, which really gives their interactions some depth. Much of Destiny’s other character work this episode involves her helping some of the town’s residents–in particular, the mother of a young baby–out with procuring some basic supplies like food and such. It’s really lovely to see, and she remains a great character. (One of the very few ways this show could realistically greatly disappoint me is if they were to simply make Destiny disappear in a proverbial puff of smoke if Cosette were to come back.)
And about those D2s. We learn that, surprise: Shindler has been able to lead them around by the nose this entire time.
One of Hell’s abilities as it turns out, is to “wake up” sleeping D2s with her tuning fork. Cleverly, we actually saw this in action way back in episode three, but it was there devoid of any context, so we didn’t know what was happening. Shindler rants and raves about how the world is “impoverished” and how there’s no room for the poor and unproductive in it, and how he’s the real hero here and blah blah blah. He stops just short of saying something like “history will vindicate me.” As a portrait of a pretentious blowhard who’s convinced himself that his petty narcissistic impulses are for the greater good, it’s spot-on.
Some will decry the revelation that Shindler also awoke the D2s that lead to Takt’s hometown being ransacked in the first place (and to Cosette being killed and turned into Destiny) as overly convenient. What I think should not go unmentioned here is that in the episode’s opener we see Shindler told to avoid Takt by his superior, who praises the boy as “rare.” There is clearly something going on farther up in the hierarchy of the Symphonica as well, it’s just a question of what form it will take when it finally bubbles to the surface.
Takt naturally wants to kill Shindler. It’s hard to fault him–the man murdered a town of innocent people for basically no reason at all–and the episode ends on a cliffhanger as the two are about to face off. Thus, unlucky number 7 comes to an end. And wow quite a lot happens in this episode, doesn’t it? I haven’t even gotten the chance to mention that Leonard and Titan return for a brief cameo, presumably setting up a role in next week’s episode.
I’m here to look grim and chew bubblegum, and I’m all outta bubblegum.
Until then, anime fans.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.
Hello folks. Quick programming note before we get started here: Frontline Report is going to be a Mondays column from now on, since it fits a bit better with my schedule. This week’s column is, we’ll say, medium length? And primarily about Rumble Garanndoll. Listen; some weeks you don’t choose the anime, the anime chooses you.
Hope you’re all doing well out there, anime fans.
Rumble Garanndoll
Most anime that suffer from the problems that Rumble Garanndoll did a few weeks back are not helped by introducing more characters. Especially not if they’re also girls with some amount of tease-y maybe-chemistry with the male lead. Yet, doing just that has put the series back on track, and its past two episodes are probably the most interesting the show has ever been. If nothing else, Rumble Garanndoll thus continues to defy expectations.
Last week’s episode, its fifth, concluded the miniature story arc of Yuki Aoba. Second-introduced battery girl, and quite possibly Japan’s last surviving idol singer. The natural self-doubt that comes with being an entertainer is compounded by the wildly difficult circumstances of Garanndoll’s setting, and so Hosomichi’s task is to get her back on track when she briefly gives the idol life up. It would be easy to do this by appealing to her imagined responsibility to her fans, or to simple nostalgia for better times, and Hosomichi does in fact try both. What eventually wins her over though is the fact that Yuki as an idol is how she’s happiest with herself, anyone else be damned. Her fans love her because she is a flawed, human person, not because of the artifice. This being Garanndoll, all of this climaxes with Yuki’s own version of the reconfigurable titular mecha–the Rabbit Two–blasting a True Army general to the ground with a rabbit-shaped beam made out of pure Idol Energy. As always, Rumble Garanndoll is at its best when it’s being least subtle.
And speaking of that, the show’s sixth episode is….well, it certainly is something.
I’ve previously commended Garanndoll for its general worldview as one of the show’s strengths. But if one ever thought that it was holding back, today’s episode tosses all subtlety to the window. This is very much a “backstory” episode, and an interlude between the series’ more bombastic moments. But in between usual interstitial fare like fun character interactions (and here, a harem series dynamic that only just manages to stay on the right side of the endearingly cheesy / annoyingly irritating divide), we get Rumble Garanndoll’s take on Japanese Nationalism.
Yes, you read that right.
It will shock no one who’s been following the series that it’s not a worldview the show holds in high regard. But even I was rather surprised at how blunt this sequence is. The conceit here is that one of the resistance’s members has smuggled in a propaganda film from the so-called True Country. There’s been some indication that they were from another world / another timeline / something like that. What’s made clear here, as the black-and-white war reel opens with a declaration that it was made in Year 90 of the “Eternal Showa Era,” is that this other world is one where Japan (and by implication, their allies as well) won World War II. Quite literally, the Japan of Rumble Garanndoll has been invaded by its own fascistic past. If that’s not quite condemnatory enough, here is what resistance commander Balzac says, word for word from the English sub track.
And coming in for the final blow is this interjection from Hosomichi’s “boss,” probably the most morally questionable character on the protagonists’ side of the show.
He perhaps has a talent for understatement.
The propaganda video itself is all monochrome authoritarian bluster. Captain Akatsuki Shinonome, our running background antagonist, decries the people of Garanndoll’s Japan–the declared “Illusory Country,” a heavy-handed erasure of the worth of millions of people–as failures with a “loser mentality.” If the show’s drawn lines from otaku culture to antifascist resistance have ever seemed silly (and I wouldn’t blame anyone for thinking they were), it’s worth noting that the rhetoric here is rooted in real examples. Moral panics about pop media permeate conservative regimes on both sides of the Pacific.
The propaganda film itself is eerily well-done, too. All monochrome except, of course, for the politically-charged imagery of blazing pink sakura blossoms.
Lest you think I’m giving the show too much credit for the “obvious” stance of being pro-democracy and freedom and anti-authoritarianist and censorship, I would point out that it is vanishingly rare for any country’s popular media to engage in such an openly condemnatory way with the dark parts of its own past. Nor does being “obvious” detract from its relevance and importance in a period of time where fascist talking points are increasingly resurfacing worldwide.
All this in the same episode that has a rather silly and drawn-out bath scene. What can I say? The show contains multitudes.
Mieruko-chan
In its more comedic moments, Mieruko-chan can struggle somewhat to justify its own existence as an adaption. At most things that make the series what it is; the creeping tension cut with enough comedy to keep it from being overwhelming, the manga is simply the better option. What Mieruko-chan the anime does offer though, if episode six is any indication, is a real treat on the rare occasions when the supernatural is helping Miko, in as much as it ever does.
The “Shrine Gods” chapter is adapted here, and it’s easily the standout sequence of the series so far. Miko bears witness to a pair–and then a trio–of shrine deities exorcising one of the most frightening phantoms she’s yet encountered. All while Hana remains naïve to the entire affair; fiddling with her phone camera and talking about Instagram while what’s essentially a horror’d up version of a shonen fight scene happens mere feet away. It’s funny, sure, but in moments like this Mieruko-chan feels like it’s exploring something a bit more worthwhile than the more disposable episodes of the anime adaption so far. Let’s hope it keeps that up.
Manga
Spy X Family
Wow, I know! A manga entry in a week where I’m not doing an actual manga shelf column. There’s a reason for that, though. I don’t have a ton to say about Spy x Family. I think it’s cute, charming, and funny. I picked it up again (after something of a false start a year or two ago) because I was interested in checking out the upcoming anime adaption. I can definitely see where enhancements and changes might be made, in particular with regard to Anya’s very good habit of looking incredibly smug. (And of course, I am very eager to see the beautiful Lor in animated form. 😊) Other than that? Everything you’ve heard about this one is true, I recommend checking it out if you have a chance.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.
We’ve got quite a trio of writeups here. In this week’s FLR we’ve got me thinking myself into a tizzy about one anime, being arguably too harsh with another, and then there’s Heike Monogatari, which remains basically unimpeachable.
I have to admit that any time I pen something like the latter two writeups here I worry I’ll acquire a reputation as an “issue critic”, or worse, a simple whiner. Hopefully, you’ll all take me on my word that I write what I write because to me, it is the truth, even if sometimes I can only arrive at it through a minor crucible of self-doubt. Honesty is the profession’s one requirement, and there’s nothing more honest than that.
Seasonals
The Heike Story
Of every anime I have ever covered on this blog, The Heike Story is, if not the most difficult to write about, certainly at least up there. On some level, what is there to say? Each and every episode advances the slow tragedy of the Heike Clan’s downfall. Their legacy melts away in real-time like snow in Spring. You can’t capture this kind of poeticism in plain language, not really.
Nonetheless, this episode stands out. One of Kiyomori’s plans to strike at the Clan’s enemies again goes awry; literally up in smoke, as one of Shigemori’s sons accidentally sets a whole temple complex alight. For his sins, his wife dreams of Gozu and Mezu foretelling his impending doom, threatening to drag him to Hell.
In the real world he burns alive as he’s set by a fever so intense that water literally evaporates upon contact with his skin. It kills him, eventually, his only regret being unvisited vengeance upon his enemies.
This pushes the household to a breaking point, and Biwa is kicked out by Sukemori as winter sets in. Where will she go? It’s impossible to say.
I have wondered more than once while watching Heike Monogatari if some of its characters, in their bottomless arrogance and self-assured righteousness, might resonate in a truly dark way with the current leaders of our world. Just something to chew on.
Komi Can’t Communicate
Administrative note: I am following NovaWorks’ absolutely gorgeous fansub for this series rather than the official subtitles. If you’re wondering why I seem to be several episodes behind, that is why.
The issue I always had with Komi‘s source material is that I could never quite understand what tone it was going for. On the one hand, Komi is something of a cringe comedy. A decent amount of the humor comes from Komi’s own ability to fail to perform basic human interactions, and most characters other than Komi herself (and Tadano) are, well, often pretty rude, even when accounting for their generally wacky, cartoonish personalities. On the other, the series projects an obvious, deep empathy for its title character, and is clearly sympathetic to her struggles even as it pokes fun at the mundanity of them. The long and short of all this is that the series has a pretty weird sense of humor, and it’s sometimes hard to tell if a given joke is being made at a character’s expense (and thus, intentionally or not, the expense of the sort of person they represent) or is being made with the idea that both the character themselves and any similar persons in the audience are “in on it.” And like it or not, that does matter. It’s the difference between gentle ribbing and punching down, and it’s what separates the good examples of this sort of comedy from the bad. All this is difficult enough to square with Komi herself, but it becomes even moreso with some of the other characters, one of whom we meet in episode 2.
This is Najimi Osana. They are a gender bean.
I don’t know what line was translated this way, but to whoever chose this phrasing: bless you.
Before I say anything else; I actually like Najimi. They’re great. I just don’t really know how to feel about the fact that I like them.
Najimi is, well, some sort of gender-nonconforming. I don’t recall the source material ever getting particularly specific and this episode follows that lead. But whether they are genderfluid, nonbinary, MTF, simply a crossdresser, or some combination of the above, they are, for better or worse, the representative for how Komi Can’t Communicate “feels about” genderqueer people. In personality, they are hypersocial, flirty, a bit manipulative, and we’re told, a chronic liar. They’re very entertaining, but this depiction forces us to wade into thorny questions of representation.
I really hate having to ever address the question of whether a character is “good rep” or not. It makes me feel, frankly, like a cranky and vaguely pathetic stereotype of a critic. Look at me, being the big bad feminist werewolf ruining everyone’s fun little romcom by interrogating its assumptions about gender. It’s a genuinely sucky feeling, because every word I write in criticism of the series I feel like I must couch with repeated assurances that no, I do like it, I just don’t know about how it handles this. And on the other hand, no one’s art exists in a vacuum, so I feel like I am to some extent obligated to at least ask the question. Is Najimi’s central “joke” that they’re all of those things I listed, and happen to be, separately from that, genderqueer, or is it that they are those things because they’re genderqueer? That’s a huge distinction. The former is a personality, the latter is a stereotype. And the sexualized otokonoko is, certainly, a trope that exists in Japanese pop media, so my gut reaction drags me toward the latter interpretation, not helped by a pretty unpleasant sequence here where Najimi is nearly assaulted by a delinquent they used to know. (Thankfully, he’s scared off before anything can happen. This isn’t really that kind of show. Still, it’s the idea.)
But of course, as a critic (and really just as a literate viewer) you should never let your first reaction be the whole of your thoughts. The other side of this is that I want to absolve Komi Can’t Communicate of responsibility here, because as I said, I like Najimi. They’re a weird little gremlin who manages to be immensely popular anyway, we’re given the comical figure that they have five millionfriends, and honestly I do get it. I even think the scene where they casually insist that they’re “actually” a guy to turn someone down is kinda funny, because using your gender as a weapon to duck out of awkward social situations genuinely is amusing, it’s the sort of thing that certain genderqueer people (and I’m including myself here) absolutely would pull if they could. It’s almost Bugs Bunny-ish.
So I don’t want them to be bad. I want to live in a world where original mangaka Tomohito Oda came up with this character because he thought they’d be funny on their own merits. I want a genderqueer character to just be able to exist in an anime and be a funny little Starbucks goblin and have it not be a big deal. Maybe that’s why I am willing to take Najimi’s presence in the series (and their general characterization) on good faith. For me at least, and for now, it’s enough that they’re entertaining and funny and endearing. But it may not be for everybody, and I think both stances are okay as long as they’re arrived at properly. Such things are rarely cut and dry, and if you take away nothing else from all this rambling, let it be that. I have said all I said (and worried greatly about coming across as though I’m trying to shame people, which I’m absolutely not), but I must again reiterate that I genuinely really like the character.
And gosh, look at all this. I’ve written all I’ve written and barely touched on the actual plot of the episode itself. It’s a good one, despite any impression to the contrary I may have made here. Komi Can’t Communicate continues its impressive visual run here, and there’s a really fun bit where we see the same scene twice from two different perspectives back to back. The extended riff on Starbucks near the end of the episode where Komi is tasked with memorizing a monstrously long order (Najimi’s naturally. Yes, the “Starbucks goblin” descriptor was relevant. I’m such a good writer) is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in an anime this year. Shout out to this guy; “wearer of the black apron” indeed.
So yes, all my thinking in circles aside, it’s a largely good episode. Komi Can’t Communicate remains one to watch.
But now we have to get to the show that I actually am kind of disappointed with. Although here too things are….complicated.
Rumble Garanndoll
There is a thin line between being self-aware and being self-impressed. Has Rumble Garanndoll crossed it? I wouldn’t say so, but it’s getting awfully close. Followup question: do you remember Darling in the FranXX? Because somebody on Rumble Garanndoll‘s production team definitely does.
That’s probably a bad first impression to make for an episode that I did enjoy parts of, but it is very easy to see where Garanndoll might fall apart, and on several occasions over the course of its third episode I felt like I was watching Garanndoll get dangerously close to shattering in real time. As such, this writeup is going to mostly be about what I did not like about the episode, with apologies to the animators who continue to make Garanndoll a visual treat.
Let’s go over what Garanndoll has gotten right so far, first. Fair is fair, after all. It does correctly identify that otakudom–like any counterculture–is fundamentally incompatible with authoritarian ideologies. As close as the two can get to being bedfellows is proponents of the latter treating members of the former like useful idiots (that’s more or less what by-now recurring antagonist Hayate’s role is, and it’s something that happens in the contemporary cultural landscape all the time). Inevitably, the fascistic drive to purge “degeneracy” will take hold, and all art and culture will be subsumed beneath a nationalistic monolith. Garanndoll knows that, as demonstrated here where it contrasts how the Shark One works with how the villains’ mecha work. (The Shark is powered by passion and strength of feeling. The various mecha that the bad guys are playing with? “Patriotism.” That’s not terribly subtle commentary.) Inside Rin’s own mind, the only thing that’s able to defeat her fantasy flights of transforming heroes and giant robots are the memories of the villains themselves.
Again, not subtle. (And fittingly; one of the best parts of the episode.) Countercultures and authoritarianism are natural enemies; that’s a good and true thing for the show to grok. It resonates, even if it’s not exactly a novel observation.
What I worry Garanndoll may not understand is that passion for art–or more specifically what I will generally term “geek shit” here–cannot actually defeat authoritarianism by itself. I mentioned DarliFra in the opening paragraph, and while that show had numerous issues, it did also understand that you couldn’t kill the monster of fascism with hot blood alone. You need empathy, you need love, and you need thoughtfulness and planning. It was very bad at actually implementing those ideas but it at least knew that it had to try. I’m not sure Garanndoll does, which is a pretty serious problem for a show whose whole core idea pits a group of nerds-turned-rebel-alliance against the marching army of a culture-hostile dictatorship.
And there is another comparison to be made to DarliFra, and it’s the one you were probably expecting. I’ll level with you folks; I am far less anti-Guys In My Anime than many other lesbians I know who watch the stuff. I am not opposed to dudes. I’m not opposed to dudes in the lead role, even. But they have to be at least a bit interesting, and–here is another place where Rumble is starting to stumble–it cannot push heteronormative nonsense. Initially I thought male lead Hosomichi’s career as a host would be a vehicle for, something interesting. Perhaps a gentle once-over about how nerdy men tend to look at women. So far it’s mostly been a plot device, and here he gets roped into eyeroll-inducing platitudes about “a man and a woman” and about every time one was on screen I glared at my monitor so hard I thought I might melt it. To me, that is far more obnoxious than someone’s cheeky cut-swipe of a bad mecha anime from a few years ago.
Directors, writers, you must be aware that there are plenty of women who watch your work, or else you would not have written the female lead as an otaku girl. Honestly this kills me; Rin is not some two-bit wish fulfillment fantasy, I have known plenty of people who would wear a Mega Man outfit to their job if they thought they could get away with it, and I have known women–and am a woman–who love their giant robots. No one in 2021 wants this “and he gets the girl” shit. It has to be more earned than this. And to Garanndoll‘s credit maybe it will eventually earn it, maybe even in the episode airing tomorrow. It just really has not done so yet. But I’m skeptical now–more than I want to be–especially because the teased introduction of another girl at the end of this episode has all the hallmarks of a lazy harem setup. You can do better than this, can’t you? To use the show’s own symbolic language; watching Garanndoll should make me feel like my passion battery is charged up, not like it’s running on empty. I know this may seem hard to believe given all I’ve said, but I like this show, and the last thing I want to see it do is trip over the Sexism Bar and fall flat on its own face. It deserves better than that.
Elsewhere on MPA
First Impressions: High Guardian Spice – This show seems like decent fun. I haven’t watched more of it since I wrote this and I don’t really intend to. So if you’re looking for an “authoritative” opinion on it I’d suggest turning to other critics–probably those with more experience and more interest in writing about contemporary American cartoons–but if you just want my two cents, here it is.
Let’s Watch takt op.Destiny: Episode 4 – This is my favorite episode of takt op since its premiere. I think that really says all you need to know, doesn’t it?
And with ALL OF THAT said, I hope you all have a Happy Halloween and a good rest of your week.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.
“Do you have a dream, Komi?” “My dream is to make 100 friends….please don’t laugh.” “Then I’ll be your first friend, and help you make the rest.”
I didn’t actually intend to write more of these for this season, but sometimes things have a way of surprising you.
Komi Can’t Communicate was not something I intended to pick up. I didn’t even really intend to watch the premiere. To tell you the gods’ honest truth, I don’t really like the original manga all that much. I know! It’s widely-liked, by enough people that it’s the sort of thing where I’ve just accepted that I’m firmly in the minority. I followed it for a few months when it was relatively new, and it just never inspired any strong feelings in me. I had some things I kinda liked about it, some things I kinda didn’t like, but on the whole it didn’t move me. I didn’t get the hype. But I started hearing things about the anime; positive things. Things that were so positive that I felt like I just wouldn’t be doing my job if I felt like I didn’t at least look into it. And good lord, what a difference a change of medium can make.
On paper, Komi Can’t Communicate shouldn’t really work as an anime. This is a series whose primary character dynamic hinges almost entirely on talking. No, not talking; non-verbal communication. It’s a bit of a challenge to make that visually interesting. And indeed, while the manga itself certainly has nice art, I wouldn’t say it’s terribly visually dynamic. That can be a real problem in motion! So how did Komi‘s team overcome it? Well, in a way, the answer is very simple.
They turned in one of the best productions of the entire year.
Komi Can’t Communicate is gorgeous. (Enough so in motion that it’s actually rather hard to capture its appeal in still screenshots.) Its only real competition this season is takt op.Destiny, from which it is stylistically whole universes away. But while takt op is bone-cracking action and melodramatic camp, Komi Can’t Communicate zeroes in on the warmth of youth, even when it’s being funny. It’s a feeling I associate more with films like Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop than I do TV anime. That’s not to say that Komi is particularly serious–it’s a fairly straightforward and lighthearted show–but it’s straightforward and lighthearted while looking utterly beautiful. This is the sort of thing that even those wholly uninterested in its plot can watch for visuals alone. There’re loads of clever little tricks in here; cut-ins, overlaid text, subtle art style shifts, etc. Some of these are inherited from the manga, but even those simply look way better here. This is a truly rare elevation of the source material, and I think even those who love the manga will agree with that.
This shot is from the OP, which is an instantly-iconic, sun-drenched piece of loveliness.
Its actual plot is so basic that it barely warrants summarizing. What do you want me to say? Boy meets girl! This is simple stuff. But Shouko Komi herself (our female lead) is an interesting character. As the title implies, she has what is colloquially known in Japan as a “communication disorder”. This to say: she cannot talk to people. Her case seems to be particularly bad. Over the course of the first episode, actress Aoi Koga (who recently made a name for herself as the title character in Kaguya-sama: Love is War!), doesn’t say a single actual word. Her vocal consists of flustered stuttering. That’s it.
But as the narration helpfully (and truthfully!) points out, people who have these kinds of difficulties do not crave human contact any less than anyone else. Komi still badly wants friends, but her anxiety is such an issue that she can’t bring herself to even say things as simple as morning greetings to anybody. Worse; all this, combined with her general appearance, has convinced most that she is an archetypal “cool beauty”, rather than a kind, gentle girl who deeply, simply wants to have friends and live a normal life.
That’s where our other lead comes in. Hitohito Tadano is an astoundingly average fellow, aside from his odd (but quite cute) habit of wearing a flower in his hair. The only “skill” of any kind that Tadano brings to the table is that it’s he who first recognizes Komi’s true nature. So, they get to talking. Or rather, to writing, as he comes up with the idea that using the classroom chalkboard while they happen to be alone between classes might be less anxiety-inducing than actually speaking aloud. By coincidence or by competence, he hits on the right idea, and the episode’s entire middle third is the two getting to know each other through a sprawling correspondence of chalk. This was cute in the manga. Here, it’s enrapturing, it pulls you in. For a few minutes, these two teenagers getting to know each other seems like the most important thing in the world.
Eventually, they come around to the exchange quoted at the top of this article. Things take a turn for the more comedic not long afterward, as the narration reminds us that the high school in which Komi Can’t Communicate is set is full of wild, wacky characters. (In the manga, I remember this kind of being a turn-off for me. I suppose we’ll see how it’s handled here.) So perhaps Tadano’s got more than he bargained for, but one gets the sense that he’d be okay with it if he knew. And that’s really the key thing; what makes a romance anime work is that we the audience have to believe that these two characters are interested in each other on a fairly deep level. Komi Can’t Communicate‘s first episode proves it with a startlingly clear, rosy, warm portrait of two young people who simply happened to be there for each other at the right time. For whom that simple serendipity will likely develop into much more. What else could you ask for? Komi and Tadano both get a little less lonely. The world gets a little brighter.
Grade: A+ The Takeaway: Komi Can’t Communicate stands as the season’s second truly essential anime. If you’re interested in romance anime as a genre or seasonal anime as a format, you should check this out.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Let’s Watch is a weekly recap column where I follow an anime for the course of its entire runtime, and provide thoughts and analysis on each episode. You should expect spoilers for both the current episode and all episodes before it.
Serious question; did people think that takt op.Destiny needed to like, explain itself?
Surely some people must have. That’s the only explanation I can really muster for the puzzling note on which the second episode, “Music -Reincarnation-” opens. We open not by picking up after last week’s riotous romp, but at some point before then. A sort of “how we got here.” takt op here runs through its world’s and protagonist’s backstories competently, but without much flash. We see that Takt lost his father. We see him struggle and, frankly, fail, to cope by holing up in his room for an unknowable amount of summers, pounding away at his piano but interacting with no one but Cosette and Anna. (The former of whom acts notably differently here than she does in the first episode, but we’ll get to that.) He gets snippy with them and balks at the suggestion that anything is wrong. Typical traumatized teenager stuff, mostly.
None of this is bad, but it’s a far cry from the knock-you-on-your-ass bombast of the opening episode. Certainly I don’t know how those who liked takt op.Destiny’s more lighthearted side are going to react. And while it’s certainly tolerable, it would be a pretty disappointing note for the show to continue on if it weren’t leading up to something. Thankfully, it is.
You see, it turns out that a traveling, Symphonica-sponsored music festival will be arriving in town. Surely, nothing bad could come of this.
For a while, nothing does. Grand Maestro Sagan (the one responsible for the “music ban” in the first place) makes a brief but notable appearance. Other than that, the festival sequence is fairly lighthearted and warm. Takt and Cosette even play piano together at one point. It’s cute.
Oh you cishets and your instruments.
Of course, this is not the sort of show where things stay copacetic for very long. Soon, a band of D2s are attracted to the festival and everything goes to hell. Cosette nearly dies, Takt loses an arm. If that doesn’t seem to immediately square with what we’ve known of the series so far, you’ll want to hold on to your monocles, because the final few minutes are where “Music -Reincarnation-” really earns its stripes. (And, yes, explains its title.)
We don’t get the specifics–and why would we need them?–but Takt unintentionally does some kind of music-magic that infuses Cosette with new life and seemingly transforms her into a Musicart. We end on a cliffhanger, but not before some truly stunning, wonderfully melodramatic dialogue and imagery.
The remainder of this past-set story to be resolved sometime next week, we must assume.
In general, it’s kind of an odd follow-up to the first episode. Mostly for how tonally different it is, and for the implication that the Cosette we got to know last week is not “really” her. (I suspect, even though it doesn’t come up explicitly here, that being infused with a Musicart somehow changes one’s personality. Recall that Cosette was almost android-y at times last week.) But if takt op.Destiny wants to trade in some of its visual oomph for melodrama, I think it turns out to be well-earned here. I just hope the series doesn’t forget why people tuned in in the first place.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.
A majority of this year’s real marquee anime have been pretty serious affairs. Analyses of the human psyche, explorations of shared generational trauma, things of that nature. Even the great final conclusion of the Neon Genesis Evangelion saga, Thrice Upon A Time, among the medium’s defining achievements this year, fits in here. And that’s all well and good! There is an important, well-earned place for that sort of thing in popular art. But if you’ve felt like something was missing–something simpler, something closer to the root of why people tend to like cartoons in the first place–Rumble Garanndoll may just be what you’re looking for.
This one fits in a curious tradition of self-aware otaku escapism shows. The first episode points toward commonalities with series such as Anime Gataris and the Akiba’s Trip anime or even The Rolling Girls. (Hell, Kill la Kill arguably fits in here.) Effectively, anime that serve as defenses of themselves and by extension the entire medium. You need to be careful with this kind of thing, because it’s easy for it to drift off into self-absorption. No one truly thinks that anime is the most important thing in the world, but the magic of good anime is that it can make us feel like it is, if only for half an hour or so at a time. This monumental task; essentially to both be entertaining and justify its own existence at the same time, is what stands before Rumble Garanndoll. Lesser anime have crumbled in the face of this challenge. But Rumble Garanndoll is willing to try anyway, as evidenced by the existence of its frankly hilarious “OTAKU ISN’T DEAD” tagline.
It’s too early to say definitively if Rumble Garanndoll pulls the whole thing off, but we’re off to a good start. Our lead is Hosomichi Kudo, ex-otaku and–this isn’t a joke–employee of a host bar. He takes his glasses off in order to avoid having to look his clients in the eye while he talks to them and has the opening theme of an in-universe anime (the fictional Sea Emperor Zaburn) as his ringtone. While he is clearly meant to be, to some point, You, Dear Otaku, he has more personality than the blander end of the Protagonist-kun spectrum. There’s a big gulf between that and being an actually great main character, but it’s progress. He may get there.
Chug!
As for our setting? Just the usual. A Japan that’s been divided in two by a fascist, art-hating oppressive state lead by a guy who can’t be older than 20 or so. He inherited the position, and the state is called the “True Country”. Just so you don’t have any illusions about who the bad guys are here.
Sure you are, bud.
The other half of that “two” is the Fantasy Country, which, although it’s not explicitly spelled out here, seems like a dystopic extension of modern Akihabara. (We do learn that specifically one thing is from Akiba, which we’ll get to.) The first episode opens with the True Country invading the Fantasy Country, via squat, diminutive mecha that might remind viewers of 2019’s similarly-titled Granbelm.
A lot happens during the invasion, but the main thing is that a lone rogue mecha dares to stand up to the invaders. Its name is Shark One. It’s a blue, adorable thing, and it’s kept active by an AI-droid-thing-it’s-not-totally-clear yet called a Battery Girl. The one who controls Shark One is named Rin, and she is just great, an instantly-likable little firecracker of a character who spends much of the episode as a moeblob and is willing to open up to Hosomichi because they both like Zaburn. (Being voiced by Ai Farouz helps a lot to sell the whole thing.)
Hosomichi, of course, soon finds himself in Shark One’s cockpit. There’s a lot of great back and forth here between him, Rin, and his former manager, who is tagging along for the ride. Occasionally punctuated via phone call or megaphone by the hilariously-named Commander Balzac, who seems to serve as the leader of the resistence that Rin and Shark One represent. That he kinda looks like an aging Kamina is probably not a coincidence.
This entire sequence, frankly, is charming as all hell. It also, impressively, manages to stay on the right side of self-aware, with Hosomichi and Rin’s mild embarrassment at having to scream “SHARK CAVALIER!” at the top of their lungs being the only real example. (Even that is more charming than anything.)
Crucially, it’s cut with this little bit of dialogue. The message is clear, and twofold. There is firstly the text itself, and then the subtler implication that Rumble Garandoll is not content with gesturing toward great anime. It wants to be a great anime. You don’t plant a thematic flag front and center in your first episode unless you’re very self-confident.
The aftermath of all this, of course, sees Hosomichi recruited into this (as of now, still nameless to us) resistance. The journey has just begun, for him and for us alike. We also meet Rin in her non-chibi physical form for the first time, rocking a Mega Man-inspired blue suit. She and Hosomichi have a brief squabble. Is a first episode ending on that note cliché or timeless? That, really is the question.
Art, at its absolute best, can inspire and connect us. Most anime don’t commit, full-tilt, to that aspiration. And most anime that do commit don’t succeed. (Pour one out for 2018 boondoggle Darling in the FranXX.) Will Rumble Garandoll get there? It’s really quite hard to say. But it’s possible, and for some, possibility alone will be enough. Certainly it is for me.
Grade: A- The Takeaway: For a certain kind of person–and you know who you are–this is a must-see. Most others should at least give the first episode a watch unless this kind of thing just strongly isn’t your cup of tea.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.
You would have to be a very specific kind of person to prioritize watching Build Divide: Code Black over most of what’s airing this season.
The very first thing to know is this. Build Divide is based on a trading card game. The second thing to know is that said game appears to be paper-only. (I cursorily googled to try to find a digital client, official or otherwise, and had no luck.) The third thing to know is that this anime is produced by the famously spotty LIDEN FILMS, who seem to have picked up a weird habit of working on things with “Code Black” as a subtitle, following their excursion into Cells At Work: Code Black earlier this year.
So right off the top; you must ask yourself if you want to watch a decent but certainly not amazing-looking anime for a card game that you’re probably, just speaking statistically, never going to get to play. Oh, and it’s two cours. That’s a lot to ask upfront. There are a number of anime airing right now, both better and worse than this, that simply don’t demand you to care about quite this many things. To put it in video game critic journalist terms, I would not say that Build Divide: Code Black “respects your time.” Just from a practical point of view, no matter how good or bad the series up being, that is a pretty hefty disadvantage to have to overcome.
Normally I’d here segue into telling you what the show is actually is about, but the plot details we get here are hilariously sparse. Beating the local big kahuna at a card game lets you get a wish granted. Our female lead (Sakura Banka) has a wish she wants granted. Our male lead (Teruto Kurabe) doesn’t but is preternaturally good at TCGs. Also he has amnesia. There’s your plot beats, all of them, as laid out in the anime’s first 20-odd minutes. So we can safely toss this into the “ignore” pile, right?
Well, for many people, probably. The issue, at least for me, with writing Build Divide off is that while the first episode certainly didn’t wow me the way some have this season, it did leave an impression. Make no mistake; this is a very weird show, at least when measured against the general seasonal anime cycle.
With very few exceptions all the cards are represented by anime girls, by the way. If you were curious.
The obvious thing to try to do when your anime is based on a TCG is to have one character explain the basic rules concepts to another. If you don’t do that, you’re generally in subversive, dark-take-on-the-genre territory, and there aren’t a lot of anime that fit that bill. (I challenge anyone to name one that isn’t Wixoss.) So what do we make of what Build Divide does, where the rules are explained, but only very generally and briefly, to Teruto by Sakura? Halfway through their obligatory match in this episode, Teruto’s amnesia begins to crack and the entire thing turns into a long chain of complicated effect combos. Some of it is quite neat to look at, certainly, but there is no way that we, the audience, could possibly have any context for this.
Is that incompetence? Is it on purpose? If so, why? The odd writing applies to the entire episode, but is most obvious here, where the cliché plot beats of this sort of episode are reduced to almost impressionistic abstraction despite the workaday visual style. There’s a lot of cool imagery, including a recurring casino motif, and the episode is visually-speaking oddly moody in spots, taking place as it does entirely at night. There’s also the random aside where we learn that the cards of the game can somehow be used “outside of battle” to….cast spells, essentially? But none of this seems to really convey anything. It’s very hard to know if Build Divide knows what it’s doing.
And what do we make of Teruto himself? It’s not rare for this kind of thing to feature a protagonist who is, sometimes literally supernaturally, Just That Good at card games. Putting him in an admittedly stylish but still very peculiar bunny hoodie is a less common step, to say the least. Maybe this is how the Build Divide franchise plans to challenge Yu-Gi-Oh! By swapping gaudy hairstyles for weird hoodies. Oh, and he has a strange obsession with bread. Which includes at one point praying for a bear-shaped pastry that fell on the floor because it’s “dead.”
Maybe this is the season where writers finally learn that the way to make your stock brown-haired lead interesting is to just make him a total weirdo.
If it sounds like I just have no idea what to make of this series so far, it’s because I don’t. Build Divide: Code Black just doesn’t give us enough to go on. It’s a question mark both within its genre–a genre that itself is generally more associated with children’s anime, which this solidly isn’t–and within the broader season at large. It’s certainly interesting, but whether or not it will live up to its potential is a question that it is far too early to answer.
Grade: 6♦ The Takeaway: Look, on this one specifically you probably shouldn’t listen to me. I don’t even know if I’m going to watch more of it or not.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.
Let’s get one thing clear straight away; suicide is not a funny topic. It’s a very serious mental health crisis that has been, and continues to be, a defining issue for the modern age. But that doesn’t mean that all fiction that deals with suicide necessarily treats it with due gravitas. Sometimes, the result is, if only in a deeply uncomfortable sort of way, unintentionally funny. Sometimes the result is Platinum End.
Toss any notions of a piece of art “earning it” or not out the window. Platinum End resoundingly does not. What we have here is a naked power / revenge fantasy about a suicidal, depressed teenager (that’d be Mirai, our lead) that goes in some truly weird directions in the meager 22 minutes of its opening episode. The very first thing that actually happens in the anime is that he tosses himself off a skyscraper. In a more serious story this would feel bad to watch. But Platinum End‘s opening minutes are so po-facedly stoic that they’re difficult to take seriously.
But those few minutes are not what we’re here to talk about. Because then, as Mirai falls, he is rescued by an angel, and everything goes topsy-turvy. Over the course of some amount of minutes, this angel, Nasse, quickly explains that she’s rescued Mirai in order to save him from depression by way of giving him superpowers; the ability to mind-control people and angel wings that let him fly super-quickly, respectively. Somewhere in here is an out of place but genuinely touching sequence where Mirai learns to fly. It is quickly brushed away by other things.
For example; Nasse is kind of incredibly evil.
Nonbinary people are presumably safe from its effects.
If Nasse were not part of this show, it would be unwatchable. If Mirai did everything he does in this episode–and trust me, we’ll get to that–of his own accord, he’d be an utterly wretched protagonist. But Nasse, an incarnation of a truly basic joke (“she looks all cute and such, but she’s actually horrible!”), makes Platinum End tick. At least on some level. Almost from the moment she and Mirai meet, she’s all bad suggestions all the time, like a reverse guilty conscience. She’s the devil on your shoulder disguised as an angel; and surprise, you don’t have an actual angel. She is, in the purest sense of the word, incredible.
Were the show solely Nasse encouraging Mirai to do awful things, it might be legitimately great. It’s unfortunately forced to settle for merely funny-bad because of what those awful things actually are, and because of Mirai’s motive for going along with them.
You see, Mirai’s backstory is that when he was seven years old, his entire family died because someone planted a bomb in their car. He was taken in by his aunt and uncle, who proceeded to abuse him all the time….And that’s basically all we get. This isn’t to say that there aren’t real people in situations this bad, because there certainly are, but it all feels so perfunctory that it’s hard to get any emotion out of it. Panic laughter, perhaps, but that’s all.
My life was Angel Beats! levels of sad so now I’m moping on a Mayan temple.
Nasse ends up informing Mirai that the bomb in said car was planted by his adoptive family. Understandably both suspicious and furious, he confronts his aunt, who he uses his “red arrow” of mind-control powers on. Things get out of hand; she tries to seduce him (ew), and when his uncle barges into the room, Mirai screams that the both of them should just die. Since his aunt is under his mind control spell, she promptly stabs herself in the neck and bleeds everywhere. It’s astoundingly tasteless and, in more than one sense, pretty gross!
The thing is, the episode more or less just ends there, but not without dropping one more twist. There’s a cut to a few days afterward where Mirai is hiding out in a hotel. And here is where we learn–in a setup shamelessly nicked from The Future Diary and, honestly, probably many other stories too–that twelve other people in Mirai’s situation have been chosen as “God candidates.” One of them will eventually replace God. Who is quite strongly implied to be The Christian God, based on what we see of him. Now we don’t get the rules for this particular contest just yet, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is a death game setup, especially as Nasse cheerfully informs Mirai that he has “the White Arrow”, too. Essentially a beam of light that lets him kill anyone instantly.
Pshaw! Who’s ever heard of such a thing?
The very last thing we see is one of the other candidates, dressed up in an off-brand Kamen Rider outfit, scream that he’s a hero of justice while he impales a different candidate with his own white arrow. Perhaps this fellow (who has a full rainbow of the power-containing colored bands that Mirai has only three of) is our main antagonist. It’s too early to say for sure.
And with all of that finally out of the way, Platinum End‘s first episode, well, ends.
I don’t find myself at a genuine loss for words very often. What the hell do you say about this kind of thing? It certainly isn’t good, not in any traditional sense. And while the first episode is far better than, say, the 3D CG ten-car pileup of Tesla Note‘s, it really doesn’t mark this down as a must-watch.
But, I know myself, and I know the modern seasonal anime landscape. This is one of Those anime. Your Detectives, your High-Rise Invasions, your Gleipnirs and such. And here I go, marching right into Hell’s mouth yet again. I really, truly, do not know what’s good for me. Expect Platinum End to return on this blog, even though it probably doesn’t deserve to.
What a world!
Grade: D The Takeaway: Unless you’re as fascinated with true schlock as I am, you should probably not watch this. But if you are, this is conversely almost a must-watch. Keep possible triggers in mind though, even this first episode has quite a bit of astoundingly insensitive material on self-harm, suicide, spousal and familial abuse, and depression. I understand the impulse to watch garbage better than most; but do so responsibly, friends!
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
That’s a big call, and it’s not one I’m willing to make with total confidence. There are definitely ways Sakugan could “go wrong”, as we’ll get to, but it’s off to a hell of a start. The two are hard to compare, but while it’s less of a well-oiled machine than takt op, it’s looser and lets itself sprawl a bit more in its opening episode. That’s neither a strength nor a weakness, merely a difference, and time alone will tell which approach is more effective in the long term.
So what’s it about? Well, the very short version is we’ve got your sort of underground post-apocalypse-y setting here. It will garner comparisons to Made in Abyss and last year’s surprise near-masterpiece DECA-DENCE on setting alone and they’re not entirely inaccurate ones. Our protagonists live in an underground colony called Pinyin, connected to a network of others via a tunnel system, and with vast areas of uncharted land in-between. Those who explore those areas, and confront the dangers within them, namely the monstrous kaiju that infest them, are mech-piloting adventurers called Markers.
And about those Markers; our lead here is nine-year-old Memenpuu.
She is a child genius, has apparently graduated college(!) and has her own job(!!). She wants nothing more than to be a Marker. She is opposed here by her father, our other lead, Gagumber.
The two’s opposed but charming dynamic carries the bulk of the episode, and there’s some really great character animation sprinkled in here. Things get more serious as the episode marches on, with Memenpuu receiving a mysterious package in the mail that contains a photograph of an equally-mysterious white tower stretching into the sky that she’s had recurring dreams about. Even stranger, the package is signed as being from the mythical Marker Urorop, and contains what appears to be a map. Gagumber and Memenpuu’s relationship takes on more serious, strained shapes here, but things remain largely lighthearted for most of the episode.
Indeed, this all seems to be setting up a charming, fun-filled adventure. And Sakugan hammers that idea home enough times over the course of this episode that the astute might start to get suspicious. So it’s here that we have to talk about the elephant in the room, because as it turns out, those suspicions are very well-founded.
In the episode’s final third or so, Pinyin is attacked. A kaiju somehow breaks into the city and wreaks havoc, the local militia try futilely to fend it off. There’s a pretty excellently-animated sequence wherein Gagumber, Memenpuu, and secondary character Lynda all flee from the kaiju’s wrath. Any levity this might imply is immediately dashed when Lynda and her own father, Walsh, hop in a mecha to attempt to fend the creature off, and are almost immediately killed.
On paper this doesn’t sound so bad, but Lynda and Walsh serve as a secondary duo throughout the entire episode, so it’s clearly intended to be a shot across the heart. It works, too. Even setting aside my own reaction, one can easily find folks all across social media already mourning the characters.
This ties back into Sakugan‘s already-evident main theme; what can the older generation do for their children? When they want to strike out on their own, as Memenpuu does here, even after seeing her friend and that friend’s father incinerated before her very eyes, what can their parents do to support them? Sakugan offers no simple answers, at least not yet, but it is worth knowing what kind of anime this is going to be. Because the answer seems to involve fewer fun-filled adventures and more painful coming-of-age than one might initially assume.
Which, to be clear, is fine! Sakugan does all of this quite well. It’s legitimately a very good first episode. But speaking only for myself, I know I tend to fall off of these sorts of anime rather quickly. Something about the darkness that tends to shade these sort of tales just bounces off my sensibilities. So how likely I, personally, am to stay on board will depend on what we get aside from the trauma and crushed dreams. The first episode is willing to display a lot of character, but the question of how much of that is a feint remains an open one until the second premieres.
All this said; what I think is not always what people in general will think. So while my own opinion of Sakugan has yet to fully take shape, this is absolutely going to be one to look out for in a more general sense. Keep digging, genius girl. You might just find gold.
Grade: A- The Takeaway: If you’re not innately put off by the prospect of seeing a very young character put through the emotional wringer, this is worth following. If you highly value that kind of story, you should definitely be following it.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.
Or: Teenage Boy is Accused of Terrorism, Becomes Actual Terrorist in Response.
AMAIM Warrior at The Borderline (known more succinctly as Kyoukai Senki in its native Japanese) is a bit of a tricky one, so let’s get the simple stuff out of the way first. Point one: this is a mecha anime and the mecha are traditionally animated instead of 3D. That alone is going to be enough for some to hop on board. Point two: it’s a production by Sunrise Beyond, a subsidiary of Sunrise proper whose work outside of this show consists almost entirely of various Gundam spinoffs. Point three: Hey! The show looks pretty good, at least so far. The mecha are the obvious highlights, but in general its vision of an occupied near-future Japan comes across pretty well, and that’s worth noting.
The complicated stuff comes from that last part. AMAIM takes place in the 2060s, after vaguely-described internal problems lead to Japan being divvied up, late Qin Dynasty-style, into a number of foreign-administered extraterritorial zones. And friends, let me just say, yours truly is not an expert on history, contemporary politics, or anything of the sort, so the fact that I even have to entertain this notion hurts me deeply. But, well, the setup does seem kind of….conservative fever dream-y?
Say, in the same way that something like Red Dawn was for us here in the US of A in the ’80s.
Haha. Oh boy.
Were it only established in the opening narration, it would be easy enough to write off as a stock setup. But this comes up over and over again throughout the first episode–indeed, the main antagonists are some of said foreign military occupiers. It is they who falsely accuse protagonist Amou Shiiba of conspiracy to commit terrorism and it is they who he eventually fights against. The regime–whoever they may be, their nationality is not explicitly identified here and the one time we see flags they’re all stand-ins–is unambiguously depicted as brutal, petty, and evil.
Now, all this said. Does that immediately discount AMAIM? I wouldn’t say so. Even if you’re not simply willing to write all this off, it’s not terribly hard to figure out why there might be some Japanese resentment about foreign military presence. And perhaps interpreting all of this so literally is a mistake anyway; there are (tragically) lots of places on Earth where this kind of thing happens. It is easy to imagine simply relocating this sort of incident at home to make it more immediately relatable for domestic audiences. So, while the overtone is there at first glance, I think it irresponsible of me to hold on to my knee-jerk reaction.
But admittedly! For as much as I do try to always hold myself to the standard of taking everything on its own terms. If AMAIM weren’t so tightly-plotted, I might’ve been less charitable. The story here is quite streamlined, and there are really only two important characters in the first episode; Amou himself, and GAI, an autonomous artificial intelligence that he, no joke, finds in a box in the woods.
Me when I run out of Arizona Tea.
Amou near-literally falls into the cockpit of his AMAIM (yes, that’s what the mecha are called here, hence the title of the show.) Something called out as rare in the present day, where most are apparently remote-controlled. A night scavenging mecha parts in the woods makes him a suspect for the local occupiers, and the plot thus kicks off when he ends up having to rescue his friends from them. He ends the episode a wanted man, leaving the whole thing on a cliffhanger.
Amou is easy to root for, as a vaguely-depressed seeming kid bummed out by the state of the world who finally has a purpose. It’s decent stuff. I just wish I less felt the need to couch it in so many caveats and disclaimers. But one should always be willing to turn the critical lens inward. Maybe all this says more about me than it does about the series.
Honestly, I’ve said all I’ve said, but it’s just fun to see traditionally-animated mecha in a mainstream TV anime in 2021. (Even if I was never really against CGI, myself. SSSS.DYNAZENON remains one of the year’s best anime, for my money.)
More than most anime I’ve covered on this column, what you get AMAIM is going to depend on what you put in. Does even the vaguest scent of possibly-conservative politics put you off? You’ll want to keep far away. Are you willing to power through almost anything as long as it’ll draw a robot in two dimensions instead of three? Well, I’ve got your anime of the season. For everyone else, I think simply giving the first episode a spin to try it out is the right call, assuming mecha anime appeal to you at all.
Grade: Wow! Cool Robot! The Takeaway: If you’re into mecha, at least give the first episode a shot. If you’re put off by the possible undertones, I’m certainly not going to blame you, but I do think it’s at least worth giving a chance.
Wanna talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers? Consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directoryto browse by category.
All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.
The Magic Planet 