The story centers on “Chronos Rulers,” those who fight the time-eating demons that appear when people wish they could turn back time. The Chronos Rulers fight a time-manipulation battle against these demons. – Wikipedia
Streaming: Crunchyroll with upcoming simuldub by Funimation
Episodes: TBA
Source: Manga
Episode 1 Summary: Koyuki and her friends are about to graduate from high school. Koyuki wants to put on a musical performance at their graduation ceremony, but regrets that her brother won’t be able to attend. He passed away rescuing her from being hit by a car, and she still carries that regret with her. When other students begin muttering about a clock tower in town where one can make a wish a turn back time, Koyuki is greatly tempted by it. Unfortunately, conducting the ritual only attracts the attention of a “Horologue,” a demon who feeds on human beings’ time-related regrets. Luckily, she’s protected from harm by Kiri and Victo, individuals with some control over the speed that time progresses. They’re able to dispatch the horologue, but at the cost of some of Victo’s memories. Victo himself is the victim of a horologue; though he appears to be a young man, he’s slowly becoming younger and younger, losing time and memories of his past life in the process.
Impressions: Note: Contains a spoiler for the major revelation at the end of the first episode.
Chronos Ruler is kind of an oddity in my eyes. What starts as sort of a typical early-2000’s-style buddy cop urban fantasy series a-la Descendants of Darkness turns weird (weirder?) when we learn that the two main characters, who’d normally probably be assumed yaoi couple and primary draw of an otherwise straightforward TV anime, are actually father and son. Due to some weirdness related to the flow of time (basically the entire mechanic that makes up the plot), the youthful, twerpy protagonist is suddenly made to be a tragic figure and his “brother,” actually his son, is the one who gets to watch him slowly fade into nothingness. Fun times! It’s kind of a unique situation, a surprise for me as a viewer; for a medium that relies a lot on copying what came before, I think that’s something to be lauded. I just wish that the concept had been a part of a show less workmanlike and a bit more interesting in other ways.
As an action vehicle, this episode does some good things using what it has to work with. I thought that the opening scene was especially exciting and well-executed; Kiri chases a horologue through the streets of the city and there are lots of dynamic shots with some slow-motion pauses that ramp up the “cool” factor a bit. They also emphasize, without outright saying anything, the nature of the character’s time manipulation ability, which I thought was a nice touch. There’s also some surprisingly good CG integration in these scenes; the moving backgrounds and the horologue enemy are both accomplished using primarily CG animation, and the character animation goes between 2D and 3D in this and later scenes, depending on the complexity of the camera movement and distance from the camera. Obviously it’s noticeable since I noticed it, but I think it works well and isn’t so jarring as to become distracting. As compared to something like Hand Shakers, my low-bar for diarrhea dumping CG elements into an anime, Chronos Ruler is relatively judicious with its CG and the resulting product is very watchable.
The episode does have a glaring problem, however. Like many anime before, there is an overriding tonal conflict that takes away from the meat of the show. Overall I’d peg this as a relatively serious action/fantasy series with kind of a classic feel to it; there’s an opportunity for contextual humor with a sarcastic, cynical edge, but for the most part the story seems to lend itself to being straightforward and a little dark or melancholy. But several times throughout the episode, the character interactions devolve into something out of a manzai routine, with Kiri as the exhausted straight man and Victo as the goofball. These moments serve to heighten the tragedy of the characters’ situation when it’s revealed later, but in the midst of the exposition these moments are distracting and irritating. This episode deals with a regretful death, albeit in kind of a melodramatic way. There’s an overall sadness to it that isn’t well-served by this type of intrusive goofiness, and to be honest I’d rather be ham-handedly manipulated into feeling sad for the characters than jerked-around between feeling bad and feeling irritated over the immaturity of the production.
Time travel and time manipulation are two subjects that are rarely examined in a way that’s comprehensible, because due to the nature of time itself, messing around with it creates every manner of logical conundrum and paradox one could imagine. I doubt that this anime series, which seems to operate entirely under the guise of the “rule of cool” has the chops to really follow through on that front. And as a bishounen vehicle, well, I’m sure there are many fans who won’t worry about the father-son dynamic in the protagonists’ relationship (nor should they: people can like what they want), but for me that kind of removes all that would have attracted me from the “hot guys doing action stuff and being hot together” angle. Ultimately I’d expect this show to unfold in way that’s mildly entertaining but probably pretty forgettable.
Pros: The action elements in the first episode are pretty well done. There’s good integration of CG elements.
Cons: The comedy stuff sticks out like a sore thumb. The relationship between the protagonists could be weird/squicky for some.
Grade: C
