Living alone and never having had a girlfriend, 37-year-old Satoru Mikami is dissatisfied with how his life has turned out. But after dying at the hands of a robber, he awakens to a fresh start in a new world…as a slime monster. – ANN
Episode Summary: Satoru Mikami has had a pretty decent life so far – he’s got a good job at a good company and generally enjoys how things have unfolded. He is disappointed in his lack of a love-life, however; as a 37-year-old man who’s never had a significant other, he feels as though he’s missed out on one of life’s very important pleasures. He doesn’t have much time to lament this however, since a runaway man with a knife stabs and kills him in the street (and on the way to his favorite meal, too). With his last breath he implores his subordinate to remember him fondly (and to trash his hard drive). As the world fades into nothingness, Satoru feels his body dissolve away.
Unexpectedly, he wakes up in a strange place inside of a very strange body. He realizes after some experimentation that he’s now a slime a-la Dragon Quest, with some fairly cool skills – he can absorb magical materials and store them in his body, he doesn’t feel pain, heat, or cold, and he can regenerate after suffering damage. He realizes, though, that he’s not alone. A stentorian voice beckons to him, and after some back-and-forth Satoru realizes that he’s sharing his space with a particularly powerful and threatening dragon. They make a mutually-beneficial deal: Satoru will be friends with Verudora the Dragon, and Verudora will grant Satoru the power of magical sight. Satoru is a little embarrassed to realize that, even at age 37, he’s still worked up over making a new friend.
What was supposed to only be an urban myth turns out to be very real when high school student Asuka Tsuchimiya and her friends open the door to a parallel world when they perform a ritual. – HIDIVE
Episode Summary: When the skies are clear, a group of five girls gathers at sunset to perform a ritual of their own making. In doing so, they hope to open the gate to another world, but thus far they’ve never been successful. After yet another failed attempt, one of the girls finds an odd crystal on the ground and utilizes it to operate a crystal radio. After a while all the girls swear that they can hear odd, alien noises somewhere within the static. The girls decide to make another attempt at the ritual, even though the skies are cloudy. This time, their makeshift prayers are answered and all five are transported to a strange golden world.
Unfortunately this world is a hostile one; creatures which first appear cute and harmless band together to become a mortal threat. The group is saved through the intervention of another girl who resembles Asuka, their bubbly ringleader. The mysterious stranger defeats the creatures and guides the group back to their dimension, ordering them never to set foot in the Twilight World again. Unfortunately, she collapses before returning to her own world and Asuka is left to take care of her. It takes Asuka a while to realize that this girl, also named Asuka, may be her equivalent from an alternate dimension. The next morning, Alter-Asuka is gone, but she’s left behind a locket with the photo of a young boy inside.
Impressions:The Girl in Twilight was one of the series I was looking forward to this season, if only because conceptually it sounded kind of interesting and I have a soft spot for original anime productions (though this one is also linked to an upcoming(?) smartphone game). The first episode is not necessarily mind-blowing, but it does lay a bit of groundwork for a story that might turn out to be fun and functional.
The group performs the 4:44 ritual.
I should mention that, for ostensibly being an ensemble cast series, this episode spends very little time developing any of the characters beyond Asuka. Asuka seems to be the one who’s central to the story, so it makes sense for her to be the focal point, but I’m left wondering about the other four girls and how most of what we know about them is that they don’t exactly seem to mesh well with one-another. Their dynamic feels like it would be more appropriate for a slice-of-life comedy; each of the characters seems to have a very trope-y personality (or at least an identifiable personality quirk) which is what one would expect for a series taking a lot of moé shortcuts. It’s easy to generate comedy when the characters are all lovable misfits with clashing personalities. This series feels like it’s supposed to be much more straight-laced, however, so the friction and dissonance feels like it’s getting in the way of something that ought to be more harmonious. I’m not sure if the other characters are meant to play equally important roles later on, but I’m left wondering how that will pan out when they don’t feel like they belong in the same anime series.
I do think Asuka is a fun heroine. Her “genki” attitude gives the impression that she might be more of a side character, but in this case her peppy inclination and willingness to believe in the supernatural is what gets the plot moving. She also serves as a sharp contrast to her alternate-universe self, which is obviously intentional; I believe we’re meant to ask what sort of horrible things could have happened to such an upbeat, bubbly character to cause her to become grim and sullen. Clearly her younger brother(?) is gone in both universes; why has she accepted this and gone one to live a typical life in our universe when her alter-self has become so worn-down? I suspect the story may be moving to answer this very question.
The visual style leaves a bit to be desired. The animation quality isn’t bad by any means, but I wouldn’t have identified this as an “Animax 20th anniversary project” just by looking at it. The character animation is somewhat inconsistent throughout the episode, though I do have to call out the fact that all of the characters have enough differences in their facial features that they’re not suffering too horribly from “same-face” syndrome, as tends to happen when multiple female characters share the same anime space. The Twilight realm utilizes some 3D animation which looks fairly decent; in one scene a group of sinister snow bunnies combines to form a multi-headed serpentine creature, and the visual is fairly effective. I feel like it gives those scenes some dynamic movement that wouldn’t otherwise be possible. I do have to question the choice to make the Twilight Realm quite so yellow; I realize it’s supposed to emulate the evening sunset but the effect is low-key nauseating rather than tense and mysterious.
Is there a universe where he still lives?
What I am pretty jazzed about is that this dimension-hopping sci-fi story stars a cast of women. I feel like these types of stories tend to be the purview of young male characters. Steins;Gate and Erased immediately come to mind, as well as this season’s RErideD to some extent. Time travel plotting so often seems to revolve around men and their pain – lost loves, missed chances, the desire to save others. Orange comes to mind as an outlier, but even that dealt much more with character drama than with the details of the time-manipulating mechanic that allowed the heroine’s letter to travel into the past. With the genders (and the gender balance) reconfigured, somehow a series that doesn’t otherwise stand out all that much feels a bit fresher and more interesting. While that’s not a trait that can sustain the narrative all the way through, I think it does provide something unique for the viewer to latch onto; it’s a storytelling angle that’s sorely lacking in a lot of other anime.
I’m definitely not blown away by this episode, but I do find it encouraging in many respects. While I have nothing against slice-of-life anime, it does become a little exhausting when those are the only types of series in which one can typically find several female characters of any importance. Rather than just observing the characters existing, I would rather, sometimes, watch them acting and doing. The selection of this type of anime gets better and more robust all the time, but that doesn’t mean we should stop celebrating it when it arrives.
Pros: The main character is engaging and fun. It’s nice to have a sci-fi story with so many young women.
Cons: The cast thus far are under-developed. There are some iffy aesthetic choices.
How in the world are we bumped up against October already? As usual, due to my real-life commitments and day job, I’m left playing catch-up with this past season’s anime. But I suppose that doesn’t mean I can’t look ahead towards the anime I’ll be catching up with in another three months or so! These posts are meant to be all in fun; while I usually have some ideas about what I’m likely to enjoy, I’m almost always surprised in one way or another. Last season I was pleasantly caught off-guard by Planet With, for example – a show that I had very little awareness of prior to the beginning of the season.
This post should not be taken as a blanket endorsement of the anime series listed below; each and every one of them has the potential to misrepresent itself in ways that only become evident upon actual viewing. It’s really fun to get excited, though! I think we always need reminders that anime is worth getting excited about, and there’s always something good to watch.
Note: I’m using the current Western titles of these series to the best of my ability and as they appear in various anime news and information outlets, in the hopes that they’ll be easy to find when the simulcast info comes out. That doesn’t mean the official titles won’t be somewhat different than listed.
In 2050 engineer Derrida Yvain is famous for his contribution to “Autonomous Machine DZ,” at his father’s company, Rebuild. But when he and his colleague Nathan discover a dangerous flaw in their creation, their warnings go ignored. The next day after Nathan’s daughter Mage’s birthday party, the group barely escapes an attack by unknown forces, leading to Derrida’s unwitting captivity in cryogenic stasis. Ten years later, he emerges in a world at war with the mechanical lifeforms he helped create. Now, he fights to survive his nightmare future to make good his promise to “Take care of Mage.” – Crunchyroll
Episode Summary: Derrida Yvain is a scientist working on a team developing “automata,” service robots that have insinuated themselves into many aspects of people’s lives. They’ve recently shipped the DZ model which are considered to be top quality new tech, but Derrida and Nathan, his friend and co-developer, have discovered a bug in the DZ programming that, if activated, could cause the model to go out of control. They beg Hans Andrei, project leader, to recall the units that have already been shipped so that they can patch them, but for whatever reason that plan is a no-go. Derrida will have to meet with his father, Jacques, the original developer, to hopefully work something out. That issue takes a back seat, however, to Nathan’s daughter’s birthday.
Mage, Nathan’s daughter, is a bright girl with an interest in her father’s work. She looks up to Derrida and seems downtrodden when he declines an invitation to join in Nathan’s upcoming research. As Derrida is leaving their home, she asks him one last time to reconsider, and though he’s noncommittal he hands Mage an electronic key to pass along to Nathan. Derrida meets with his father, Jacques, the next day and the meeting goes poorly; Derrida accuses Jacques of caring more about the DZ than the well-being of his own son. He learns soon enough that Hans has a hit out on Nathan and himself for “knowing too much” about the flawed DZ programming, and having “taken care” of Jacques Yvain earlier, intends to kill Derrida and Nathan and frame it as a murder-suicide to the media. Nathan comes out on the bad end of the situation, but Derrida manages to escape into the woods where in his pained delirium he begins to see strange visions of Mage appearing and disappearing as if phasing in and out of reality. The vision leads him to an underground cryogenic facility, where Derrida’s final act is to seal himself away in one of the pods. But what will he find when he awakens?
Impressions:This review contains some minor spoilers for the first 4 episodes of the show.
Though I would have liked to have gone into this viewing session clean, I happened to read the ANN preview of the first few episodes that was posted following the recent Crunchyroll Expo convention. The article certainly gave the impression that the story was a muddled mess and the technical aspects of the show were disappointing, so my expectations were definitely tempered somewhat. To be honest, when I discovered that Crunchyroll posted the first four episodes yesterday, I looked at it as an opportunity to get this first impression “over with” so that it would be out of the way by the time the Autumn anime started in earnest. I’m not sure if it was the effect of lowering my expectations or whether I’m just not as harsh a critic, but having seen the first episode I’m kind of questioning the rude audience reactions I read about in ANN’s article. The episode certainly has its share of aesthetic problems and some of the dialog absolutely has issues with emotional realism, but while it’s mediocre it’s certainly not an unmitigated disaster.
Mage and her friend Yui enjoy the birthday party.
My suspicion is that many anime fans saw the name “Yoshitoshi Abe” attached to the series and became saddled with a set of expectations that the series could never hope to achieve. For those who are unfamiliar, Abe is an artist and writer who loaned his particular style to several well-known and influential series during the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. The most famous and well-regarded of these are Haibane Renmei, which is based on one of his own self-published manga, and Serial Experiments Lain, to which he provided very iconic character designs. He also created the NieA_7 manga, another doujinshi effort that was later adapted into an anime, though despite being fairly charming doesn’t seem to be quite as famous. In any case, to many of us who came into our own as fans around that time period, Abe’s name brings with it a certain feeling of nostalgia and admiration; it’s not surprising that the fact of his involvement would drum up some expectations about the type of story and its quality level, no matter how small his actual contribution was.
The fact is, Abe’s rich, textured art style isn’t represented well in the series; if I hadn’t been told multiple times that he was involved, I wouldn’t have guessed it on my own. The character designs as they appear in the show itself are very generic, which isn’t necessarily a problem in-and-of-itself, but it does beg the question – why employ the services of a fairly famous character artist and not go to some effort to preserve the charm of their designs? Obviously anime production is more complicated than that, as anyone who’s seen Shirobakowill attest. It’s not a system that allows the time or resources necessary for people to do their best work; we just happen to be lucky enough to get some great results some of the time anyway. Geek Toys, the animation production company for this series, is brand new, and with that newness comes many challenges. I can’t entirely fault a studio for simplifying some designs more in favor of ones that could be more easily animated. That said, the fact that there are a lot of off-model shots in the first episode doesn’t exactly bode well for how the rest of the series is going to look.
Derrida sees visions of Mage in the woods.
Some of the writing and dialog leaves a bit to be desired. I actually mistook this for a direct time-travel story; thus far the only confirmed “time travel” is Derrida’s missing ten-year gap. I make it a personal policy to look past all but the most glaring plot holes when timey-wimey stuff is involved, but judging by the first episode, time travel and its resultant paradoxes aren’t a major factor (though based on what I’ve heard that stands to change at some point). Some of the character dialog, however, feels very melodramatic, and in the “bad” (meaning: not entertaining) way. I think the best example of this occurs when Derrida confronts his father with the information about the DZ’s flawed operating system; when Jacques doesn’t give Derrida the answer that he’s seeking, the situation goes from “zero” to “you never loved me, dad!” in a matter of seconds. While I can accept the fact that Derrida and his father might have some issues to work out, introducing those issues when we know very little about either character to begin with feels more like a ploy to wring some quick, cheap drama out of an under-developed situation. I could have managed with less time spent at Mage’s birthday party if instead there would have been a few more moments spent establishing the main character’s personalty and the clearly important and probably complicated relationship he had with his genius father.
Still, I’m not ready to entirely discount the series yet, and this episode was actually fairly entertaining in spite of its flaws. At the very least, it manages to do what so few stories can; it warns us of the consequences of inaction and then, thanks to time manipulation (of a sort), proves those consequences to have been genuine.
***
Because they were available (and I decided it would be a better use of my time to watch the episodes now rather than pick them back up later), I decided to go ahead and watch episodes 2-4 of the show. It’s not my regular practice, but it’s difficult to pass on an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. In the subsequent few episodes, Derrida awakens from cryo-sleep to find that his fears have come true and that the DZ robots have gone rogue, causing mass destruction (which of course seems to benefit the wealthy Rebuild shareholders and other upper-class types, including Hans. Derrida joins up with an older man and his young daughter – two people who have the tools and survival instincts to navigate the unfriendly robot-riddled terrain. They travel to find Mage’s whereabouts, learns that she’s dead (from her friend Yuri), then learns that that was a lie. Mage is, in fact, missing. Derrida’s new goal is to obtain a copy of the software patch so that he can nullify the DZ troops and save humankind, but they learn that the robots’ malfunction was not so much a bug as it was completely intentional and entirely by design. This unsettling corruption appears to run deep and Derrida must trudge through it to find the answers that he seeks.
These episodes continue much in the same vein as the first; the show is basically competent in most respects and manages to maintain a modest amount of tension as Derrida and friends find themselves pursued by various factions (including a frighteningly-persistent female assassin who’s identity I assume is less of a secret than it first appears). Hans Andrei makes for an ineffectual villain; rather than proving to be a real danger to the protagonist, he’s mostly a bumbling rich guy who seems terrified of anything that might threaten his position. Derrida turns out to be kind of an unlikable protagonist, not because his goals aren’t sound but more because he lacks emotional range and maturity; it becomes exhausting to listen to him fly off the handle while simultaneously trying to convince (coerce?) those around him to give up their safety to help him achieve his goals.
Part of me would like to give this one a shiny “You Tried” award; I feel like this is a story someone really wanted to tell and there are definitely echoes of something bigger and better to be found within the show’s modest package. There are just a lot of aspects (visual and story-wise) that are holding it back, and as it stands it’s too much of a hard sell.
Pros: Seen from afar, the show is fairly competent, (if unimpressive).
Cons: The protagonist and antagonist are insufferable. There are many distracting aesthetic and quality-control issues.
Tanisu’s parents are mad scientists who live outside of normal society. They locked up their own children up on an isolated island and did experiments on them in secret, turning Tanisu’s older brother and three older sisters into strange creatures. One day, their parents were arrested, and the siblings were moved to another island by the welfare office. The trouble is that none of the siblings except Tanisu know how to interact in modern day society… – Crunchyroll
Episode Summary: Tanisu’s older siblings are all the result of their mad scientist parents’ experimentation. They have special forms and abilities that distinguish them from normal humans, but they know very little about how to interact with society. Tanisu’s distinguishing factor is that he’s smart and kind, and he wants for his family to be able to live among others. As the only sibling without mutant abilities, he takes it upon himself to reintegrate them all while their parents are serving time for turning them all into scientific guinea pigs.
When the ingredients for their dinner are ruined, Tanisu suggests that they all go out to eat; a big deal when most of the family is unfamiliar with common social etiquette and can’t always agree on what to have for dinner in the first place. As they sit down to dim-sum, their various alterations are on full display. Transformation, photosynthesis, predatory tendencies… these things don’t mesh well with the polite restaurant atmosphere. The other patrons begin to chatter and make remarks and Tanisu becomes more and more upset with his family. It’s only after he has an outburst that his siblings realize how important being out in public is to Tanisu, and they work to use chopsticks, clean up their table manners, and keep their abilities in check. Integrating into society might be an uphill battle, but they are beginning to take the first steps.
Impressions: This series technically debuted in the Spring (outside the US) and it’s getting pretty close to the Autumn anime debut season, so I split the difference and decided to lump it in with the Summer anime. While I think many anime fans have some complaints about anime not being simulcast in a timely manner, personally I appreciate the fact that Crunchyroll (and other services) will continue to add to their catalog as they can. And really, do you actually have time to watch 30-60 series week-by-week as they’re broadcast? Speaking for myself, that answer is “no.”
I’ve written before about the rising popularity of international anime co-productions; I can say with complete authority that I know very little about the ins-and-outs, reasons, and mechanisms of these productions, but the fact that they’re becoming more prevalent likely speaks to several different factors in animation production. While I highly doubt there’s any shortage of Japanese manga or light novels to adapt into animated form, there are definitely some overused storytelling trends among them and I suppose production committees start to see diminished returns by the time they hit isekai series number 127. I’ve actually noticed this phenomenon in another of my hobbies – lolita fashion.
Aisley has a predatory side.
As the fashion became popular in the West over the span of many years, Japanese brand dress releases were always the most coveted. They were expensive, often difficult-to-get, and featured quality materials and construction. I always felt that there was an element of copycat-ism to Japanese releases, though. If one brand released a certain print motif (chocolate, for example), variations on that became a trend for a while. Cutlery prints were popular, there have always been a lot of floral prints, and “old school” styles (solid colors with contrasting details and lace) continue to feature in brand releases to this day. There are always sailor-themed lolita dresses released in the summer time. It’s not that these prints were or are bad, but they do start to blend together after a while. The last several years, though, have shown a rise in the variety and availability of lolita fashion from worldwide indie brands, and brands from places like China, Hong-Kong, and Korea. They’ve taken the shape and general aesthetic of lolita fashion from Japan and incorporated many new and fresh ideas, from prints that feature unusual items or themes (jellyfish, bread, and I even own a Chinese dress that incorporated Egyptian iconography) to sub-styles that mimic traditional Chinese clothing. This isn’t to disparage the Japanese brands – they continue to do good work and their output was and is foundational to the fashion. But sometimes a fresh perspective is required to inject some vitality into an art form that has gotten a bit stuck in its ways.
In the case of Frankenstein Family, the typical Japanese anime format and style has been coupled with a setting that has a distinct Taiwanese flavor, thanks to its primarily Taiwanese (I think?) production staff. The character designs and animation style are all what one would expect from a Japanese anime; it’s in the small details, like the architecture, foods, and customs (such as when Tanisu taps his first two fingers on the table when his waiter is pouring the tea), that the series reveals its origins.
Content-wise, I think this first episode is an intriguing and somewhat uncomfortable (not in the bad way) blend of tones. Because the siblings are all socially-untested and display a wide array of different abilities and traits that distinguish them from typical humans, there are lots of opportunities to demonstrate just how atypical their situation is. I think my favorite character is Snow, the older brother who can transform himself into a dog. The results are as you would expect – he’s comically food-motivated, and he’s very much a lovable, clumsy ding-dong with a good heart. Spider-sis Aisley is constantly on the prowl for prey. Ashise is half-plant and would rather bask in the sun than eat human food. And nothing is a surprise to Suishi, who has psychic powers. This odd blend of characters provides many comedic moments throughout the episode, but there’s always an undercurrent of sadness and it crops up fairly often and unexpectedly.
The siblings have a long road ahead.
Honestly, the siblings’ situation is pretty horrific. Their mad scientist parents used them as experimental subjects, fiddling with their genetics to provide them with traits that make it incredibly difficult for them to get along in any sort of social context. They were kept isolated from others and then abandoned when the parents were (rightfully) sent to jail. Tanisu occupies an odd position in this mess, being the only child who wasn’t the target of his parent’s special brand of bad parenting, though it’s clear that he’s absolutely experiencing emotional after-effects of the experience. I think that’s one of the most effective parts of this episode; the sadness and horror creeps in unexpectedly, casting a pall over the characters’ everyday lives. I liken it to my experience of depression, which lurks in the background of my life until something seemingly innocuous (or, honestly, sometimes nothing at all) triggers it and it becomes a shadow that saps color from the world.
This is perhaps what’s special about the final scene, where the siblings walk together as the sun sets in a rainbow of colors. Life has been needlessly dark for them, and they had little to no choice in the matter (to some extent they don’t even seem to realize that what happened to them was wrong). But there’s some hope that, now that their situation has changed, perhaps there’s some new light to be found in the world. Many parts of the episode have a watercolor washed-out feel to them; most of these moments are asides or references to memories or past events. But this final scene in particular has a definite Makoto Shinkai influence, its magical-realism providing emphasis to what might be to come.
While the anime portion itself is actually pretty good, it comprises only one part of the episode’s run time. The rest is taken up by a couple of in-real-life voice actor segments that don’t really add much (I know there are some fans who enjoy that sort of thing, but they don’t really interest me). There’s also a really awkward part of the conversation during which one of the actresses insists multiple times that, if she could be anything she wanted, she would want to be a boy. I’m not sure if she’s genuinely indicating that she would want to change genders, or if it’s a sentiment that’s just kind of lost-in-translation, bu there’s a lot of time spent on it and I didn’t really know how I should react. I think the series would be better served by sticking to the in-anime segments and leaving the voice-actor stuff out, but I might be in the minority. I also didn’t watch another episode to see whether it carries through or not, so it might be a one-shot issue.
While this has all the hallmarks of a typical slice-of-life series with some fantasy elements sprinkled in for fun, it also has a certain freshness that I believe is due to its multi-cultural origins. These types of productions haven’t always been that successful, but I have noticed that they’re on the path to getting better and I think this series looks and feels fairly competent and distinct.
Pros: The show has a good visual style and uses color well. The blend of slice-of-life comedy and darker moments replicates the feeling of depression well.
Cons: The voice actor segments don’t add much to the episode.
The city state of Lisvalletta. Two suns rise above this city, and the people here live peaceful lives, but in the shadows crime and illegal drugs run rampant. Among them is the dangerous, highly lethal drug “Anthem” which casts a dark shadow over the city. The SEVEN-O Special Crime Investigation Unit specializes in cracking down on Anthem. This unit operates in two man “buddy” teams in what’s called the “Double Decker System” to tackle the problem. Doug Billingham is a seasoned investigator, and joining him is Kirill Vrubel, whose abilities are mysterious and unknown. – Crunchyroll
Episode Summary: Kirill Vrubel is an officer with the Lisvalletta police force who, while being a mediocre officer, dreams of becoming his city’s first real hero. He’s wanted to do so ever since he was young, but unfortunately such childish fantasies get in the way of his real-life responsibilities, so his boss has him on notice. What’s also unfortunate is that Kirill works alongside an officer named Jefferson who’s pretty much the peak of competency and a beloved family man to boot. Kirill is constantly overshadowed by Jefferson, and he’s started to get restless and annoyed.
On his day off, Kirill’s landlady sends him out in search of her missing cat. The feline pursuit brings Kirill to an empty warehouse where he ends up as witness to a violent hostage situation. The hostage in this case is none other than officer Jefferson. Worried about whether or not to get involved, Kirill is hailed by a strange man caught in a ventilation pipe. This man, named Doug Billingam, claims to be an operative for an organization called “Seven-O,” which investigates Anthem drug abuse. He promises Kirill rewards and promotions if he’ll help take down the hostage-taker. Kirill comes up with an unorthodox plan which ends up working (in a manner of speaking). Though his rashness gets him fired from the police force, he’s quickly hired by Seven-O and partnered with Doug as part of their “Double-Decker” buddy system. Though their boss has a fondness for weird nicknames, this job might be the pathway Kirill needs in order to become a full-fledged hero.
Impressions: The title Tiger & Bunny brings with it many lofty expectations; as a big fan of that series I’d been hoping for a sequel for a long time. My expectations were so high that it’s probably a good thing that this actually isn’t a direct sequel (as far as we know), but a series set in the same universe that incorporates similar aesthetics and odd-couple buddy-cop dynamic. Gone are the televised heroic antics, to be replaced by an eccentric underground investigative organization that seems content to keep itself out of the limelight. Imagine Section 9, though exponentially more colorful and filled with women who aren’t robots.
An Anthem user goes “Phase 3.”
That was actually one of the first things I noticed, both about the key art and then later about the cast make-up; there are a lot of women in the Seven-O organization. While the diversity in the characters seems to be limited to height and hair color (and perhaps also personal style), I’m pretty pleased with the ratio, at least. Obviously that’s just a first step and the series will actually have to utilize the characters in ways that are meaningful and aren’t demeaning, but the fact that the opportunity is there for it to do right is encouraging. All the characters seem to wear the same type of costume too – a trench coat with pants or something similar underneath. While I’d hesitate to call it a uniform since they’re all so diverse in color and style, it seems roughly universal and that’s kind of a nice change.
The tone of the episode is interesting; if I had to describe it, I’d say that it reminds me of the 1990’s Batman cartoon series. The city has some grit beneath its art-deco finishings, and it seems to have achieved an alternate technological future where interesting gadgetry and clothing style have superseded development of things we take for granted, like color television. Everyone seems to be fashionable in some way or another; even Kirill’s landlady seems especially put-together for the type of character she is. While the episode certainly isn’t without its share of action and excitement, there’s enough down time to take in a lot of these conscious visual decisions. While I remember noticing some of the same things about Tiger & Bunny back in the day, removing all the pomp and glamour that comes with the Hero TV framework gives us an opportunity to appreciate the subtler things about the setting.
Doug gets the upper hand.
I’m not entirely sold on the two protagonists just yet. Frankly, Doug isn’t a big enough part of the episode to really get a sense of his personality. He’s definitely the straight man of the duo, but beyond his seriousness and ability to do his job competently, the only sort of off-beat moment we get is when he gets stuck in a pipe. It’s in those brief moments that it seems he might have some good-humored appreciation of the ridiculousness of his predicament. Frankly, those are the kinds of things that I find memorable and I’d love to see more. Kirill is definitely an opposing force of personality, but he’s also the type of character I typically find really annoying – the kind that’s self-serving and gets into trouble by overestimating his own abilities. He’s very young and that affords him some leeway in my eyes, but he reminds me a little of the “know-it-all” type characters that are anything-but. Obviously it will all come down to the balance of personalities. Differences are certainly a potential source of conflict, and if that conflict remains perennially unresolved for the sake of cheap tension then I feel there’s no real purpose. But personality conflicts can also lead to growth on both sides, and I’m definitely hoping for that to manifest.
Visually this episode is impressive. I hate to keep making so many comparisons to Tiger & Bunny, but the two series unsurprisingly have similar animation aesthetics and a lot of technological improvement has happened in the seven years(!) since the predecessor premiered. Here the blend of CG character models seems more frequent and yet more subtle and well-realized. In T&B the hero suits and vehicles were the most identifiable use of CG, and there wasn’t as much blending between CG and 2D in the same shot. In this series the characters don’t really wear masks (so far), which necessitates that a lot of the close-up face shots make use of 2D animation (or suffer the uncanny weirdness of 3D anime-style character animation). I think the blend is done well. I’m not a huge fan of 3DCG that attempts to mimic 2D animation; I feel that each method has its own strengths and styles and trying to make one look like the other doesn’t do either any favors, but it’s definitely getting better and better every day. The characters have a lot of detail, their colors are bright and appealing, and overall this looks like a project into which went a lot of care and skill.
Cat-itude.
Beyond that, I’ll simply say I feel positive about this episode. To be honest, I hadn’t gotten into an anticipatory frame of mind for Autumn anime series yet, so when this episode dropped by surprise (thanks, Crunchyroll Expo!) I wasn’t exactly prepared to have composed thoughts about it. I have to say, though, that my curiosity about the series now has a little bit more structure. This episode worked very well as an introduction to the setting and characters, and it did so without being overly referential to the series to which it’s apparently related (honestly, if I weren’t already familiar with Tiger & Bunny I may not have even noticed the few minor and subtle connections that popped up). This definitely feels like its own entity, which ought to be welcoming to newcomers and possibly even to those who weren’t actually fans of T&B in the first place. If anything, you can go sneak a peek at your leisure, since the series won’t start in earnest until October.
Pros: The action animation and visual aesthetics are very appealing and have a strong sense of style. You don’t have to be familiar with the show’s predecessor to enjoy it. There seems to be a good gender balance.
Cons: It’s hard to get a good sense of the characters from this episode; Kirill seems especially irritating.
As someone who writes first episode reviews (and tends to take a long time writing them – thank you for your continued support of my slowness!), there’s nothing quite as panic-inducing as moments and events that signal the changing of the seasons. In my area, kids are starting to go back to school, the anime club I attend (which is associated with a local university) is planning its Fall Semester anime showings, and the nights have started to get much cooler (thankfully; I can’t sleep in a hot room). I’m starting to see a lot of news about upcoming anime, too. I’m not even done talking about Summer season anime! Unfortunately the march of time waits for no one, which means I’d better get my act together and get some words on the page.
This time we have a very “alphabetical” set of follow-up series. Below/within are spoilers for subsequent episodes of Angolmois, Asobi Asobase, Banana Fish, and Chio’s School Road.
Going through this process once again has reminded me of just how much interesting anime there is out there to watch, and how little free time there is to follow everything that I would like to follow. When you haven’t sampled a little of everything, it’s much easier to look from outside and decide that this show or that show doesn’t really look that interesting. Watching it, though, causes you to invest yourself sometimes, if even just a little bit. Of course, being invested doesn’t always mean that the investment is going to pay off; in the words of Kenny Rogers, sometimes you have to “know when to walk away, and know when to run.”
In this entry, I’ll be checking out some more of Island, Phantom in the Twilight, Planet With, and Angel of Death. If nothing else, this definitely gives us a taste of many genres!
It’s been a long journey making my way through the Summer anime season already, but the party’s not over! Getting a taste of so many anime has really only whet my appetite for some of them. Sometimes the first episode was so good that I’m dying to see more. Sometimes I’m somewhat intrigued and need some more information to make a final decision. And sometimes I feel like there might be a train-wreck brewing, and I need to sate my curiosity in some way. Whatever the reason is, I’ve put together a list of series I wouldn’t mind watching some more of, and I’ll be sharing my thoughts about them over a few different posts (one post would just be unwieldy). You can expect about four series per follow-up, in no particular order. It should go without saying, but below are spoilers for all the series covered (Mr. Tonegawa, Hanebado!, Harukana Receive, and Cells at Work!).
Now that all the available first-run anime has been taken care of, I thought I might do a compilation post of all the sequels and miscellaneous short anime available this season (at least those which can be had legally at the time of this writing). Some of these are sequels I’ve been anticipating quite a bit, and some of them are sequels of series that I’m not familiar with – there isn’t anything that’s a short that’s not also a sequel, and it appears that there wasn’t really any “stuff” (what I call anime made for kids that won’t hold much interest for most adult viewers) to speak of this time. I know my providing commentary on something I have little context for will be controversial to some readers, but I plan to approach it from the angle of whether I would want to go back and watch the previous episodes or not. Apologies to anyone who feels that I’m misrepresenting any series here; I imagine I’m not the only person in history who’s approached longer-running anime this way, though.
It goes without saying, but there are likely spoilers for every series written about here; if you’re not caught up on your favorites, you’re likely better off waiting until you have time to get up to speed. Also, I skipped Overlord III because it seemed more like a split-cour continuation rather than a true sequel… and I watched about three minutes of it and had no idea what was going on!
Streaming: Crunchyroll
