A story about three sisters struggling to survive in a desolate world surrounded by decaying buildings and red fog. The story revolves around Rin, a girl with an updo. There’s also Ritsu, the big sister who has cat ears and is always calm, and Rina, the innocent, cheerful one dressed in a maid’s costume. Just what is it that these sisters are after in this mysterious world? – Amazon
Episode Summary: Rin and her sister Rinako are out on a dangerous search for fresh water. They happen to find a hidden pool of it in an abandoned ship that’s been grounded on their island. They have little time to celebrate, because they’re constantly being hunted by the gigantic red bugs that fill the air with toxic fog. Rin dispatches one, but Rinako isn’t so lucky; though she takes one out on her own, her injuries are too severe and she fades away. Rin must take this bad news back to big sister Ritsu and the remaining four Rinas waiting back at home.
Ritsu uses her power to siphon the water into their holding tank, bringing all manner of debris with it. Soon they hear a splash and discover a very strange-looking bug swimming in the tank. This bug can talk, calls himself “Wakaba,” and almost looks human, but the sisters are cautious. Rin attempts to dispatch him by using one of their special leaves, but the glowing green power only seems to heal this strange creature. When another bug attacks, Wakaba tries to prove he isn’t a threat by leading Rin to its hiding spot. Even so, Rin doesn’t know what to do about him and finds herself confused.
Yukiya is about 14 years old. He spends his time DJ-ing alone. Due to his father’s influence, he’s listened to house music since he was young, and he uploads videos online. He wants to convey something to someone. He wants to be recognized, and become important. But getting hurt is scary. One day, while trying to get more views, he does something that can’t be undone. And he sees a live broadcast from “that world.” Yukiya believes he can’t do anything alone, but that he could accomplish something if he were doing it together with someone else. – ANN
Episode Summary: Yukiya is a middle school student with a modest amount of e-fame as a masked DJ “W’z” (pronounced “wise”). He wants to attend a music-focused high school next year, but his father is deeply opposed to the idea. His father has always told him never to hold hands with others. This may be because, when he does so, Yukiya has the ability to enter into an alternate, mysterious dimension; a dimension that could very well hold danger for him and others.
Yukiya confesses to his friend Haruka that he feels stuck, languishing without the kind of online views and fame he’s seeking. Haruka’s positive attitude encourages him, and he invites her to embark on a potentially game-changing move with him. As night falls, Yukiya sets up his DJ equipment in the middle of the city, then asks for Haruka to hold his hand; this transports them into a dimension of color and beauty. Yukiya’s stream starts to light up and things are going well, but then the couple is joined by several other duos who are after a particular goal.
On a planet far from Earth, there is a kingdom full of smiling faces. Princess Yūki is 12 years old, and about to enter a sensitive age in a person’s life. Everyday, she cries, laughs, and sometimes, her heart throbs with excitement. All the while, she lives merrily in the royal palace. Filling her days with color are her loyal vassals: her tutor Reira, Izana who assists in political affairs, the leader of the chivalry Harold and then, there is her childhood friend and aide Joshua. Stella is 17 years old and a capable, reserved soldier. However, she is always smiling for smiling is essential to living. – ANN
Episode Summary: Princess Yuki, at the age of 12, has come of age and can now take a more active role in running her country in the place of her late parents. She’s a kind-hearted person and the new, expanded workload is taxing, but she seems to have a knack for decision-making that relies on her kindness and fondness for the people around her. One day she’s challenged by a member of the military order named Yuni. Though the questioning turns out to be a set-up and Princess Yuki impresses with her answer, her aide and childhood friend Joshua steps in and asks Yuni for a duel.
The duel takes place within a VR simulation, so nothing tangible is at stake; still, Joshua and Yuki prove that their close relationship is worth more than the number of soldiers on their side. After this, Joshua and company leave on a diplomatic mission to the border with Yuki’s message of friendship. But what Yuki doesn’t realize (and what the delegation hopes to keep from her) is that there’s a violent conflict raging. Can the delegation protect the Princess’s precious smile?
In the future in Onomichi, Hiroshima fish disappear from the sea around the world and only whales live in the ocean. The Ministry of Fishery decides to set up giant experimental Universe Fish Tanks in space. The Onomichi Universe Fishery Union is established and begins to train space fishermen. Female fishermen are in demand due to the strengthening of an equal employment law for men and women. Six new female space fishermen are selected, and the story centers on supporting their growth. – ANN
Episode Summary: One day, all the fish in Earth’s vast oceans disappeared. Because human kind still had a taste for sushi, drastic measures were taken and special tanks were built in space to grow and harvest fish. Special space fishermen were needed to obtain the fish, and thus a new industry was born. Haru Soramachi dreams of becoming a space fisherman, if only so that her grandma can eat her favorite sushi again. She travels to the coast to join a space fishing program where she can eventually join the ranks of the high-flying astronautical fishermen.
Unfortunately Haru’s sense of direction is lacking and she winds up completely off course, stumbling into a heated argument between a couple of girls her age and some men who are already established fishermen. Makiko and Namino claim Haru for their team (her sweatsuit bears the insignia for the space fishing organization, so she must have some idea of what she’s doing), thus forming a proper group of three to fish in space. Haru unfortunately has no experience operating the fishing equipment and needs instruction from the ground up. When she’s told to choose a guardian deity to accompany her, she picks the one known to be most useless. It’s no surprise that the men claim victory over the three girls, and their unauthorized expedition ensures there’ll be hell to pay once they get back to solid ground.
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.
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.
Souya Kuroi has dreams of people with superpowers fighting a massive dragon in the sky, but his real life is almost as weird. He’s had amnesia for about two weeks and been taken in by a maid and an anthropomorphic cat. When a UFO in the shape of a stuffed bear approaches Sorimasaka City and other metros around the world, he’s startled to see seven rainbow-sparkling heroes zoom out to confront it – just like in his dream. Even weirder, the maid wants him to leave his shelter to confront these heroes and take the source of their power. – ANN
Episode 1 Summary: Souya Kuroi is living with amnesia, but seems relatively unaffected by it. Though his family might be dead (maybe?) and he doesn’t really know who he is, he doesn’t have enough of a memory to realize that he should be upset. He was taken in by a maid (“Ginko”) and a giant cat (“Sensei”) after his accident, so he’s got a place to stay and food to eat (though he’d prefer if there were more meat). School is fine, too, though he still has some trouble remembering his class rep’s name, and she seems to be pretty invested in his life so that creates lots of opportunity for embarrassment on his part. One day while Souya is just sitting around in math class, there’s an announcement about a UFO approaching the mainland; it turns out that it’s one of many horrifying bear-shaped aircraft that have appeared all over the planet. The world watches as a troupe of seven “superheroes” arrive out of nowhere to dispatch the “enemy” but Souya is given specific instructions from Ginko to leave the school building and, eventually, fight against those heroes. When he finally confronts one of the seven individuals, he joins with Sensei to become a powerful and strange fighting unit that’s bigger and stronger than either of them. When he obtains a pendant from the defeated “hero,” Souya’s memories begin to come back to him and they suggest some horrifying things.
The whole world was devastated by the nuclear war. Under the strong rule of the World Empire, people are all suppressed and deprived of their own lives. A resistance team secretly keeps fighting to break the suppression while everyone is forbidden to possess any force of arms. The team arms themselves with “antique guns” that were left as works of art, and the incarnations of those antique guns are called “Musketeers” appear and join the team, as if they responded to the soul of the resistance. In their battles with the incarnations of contemporary guns who represent and are dispatched from the Empire, the “Musketeers” turn their “Absolute Noble” mode to give a powerful boost to themselves, and bring hope to the world. – ANN
Episode 1 Summary: Dreams of world peace were shattered when, after years of nuclear war and an alteration of the world’s climate, the World Empire took over and subdued the populace by force. Their rule is harsh and tramples over the very dignity of the people. But a resistance has formed in the underground, supplemented by the talents of a group of weapons-turned-human. These individuals have the power and personality of the antique weapons from which they were formed as well as a certain “x-factor” of absolute nobility in the face of danger. Many of the new recruits are forced to attempt a dangerous mission to save a resistance politician being transported to the capital. When the situation seems dire, one of them expresses their nobility and is given enough power to shoot down the Empire’s soldiers. But then he collapses on the battlefield – is this a doomed mission after all?
Impressions: The various ToukenRanbu anime incarnations made their marks by featuring a cast of characters based on personifications of various famous weapons (mostly melee weapons) that appeared throughout history. The Thousand Musketeers attempts to do the same by focusing solely on firearms and attempting to draw forth some kind of identifiable character personality from each classic, historical, or antique weapon. Thus far the end product is a very mixed bag of simple-yet-confusing plot elements and a cast that’s jam-packed with characters that are often difficult to distinguish from one-another.
Napoleon – a fancy gun with a fancy hat.
The opening scenes of the anime present several characters back-to-back in quick succession, each with a title card and a short description of their origin as a famous gun. This is, of course, while they’re all having conversations related to their general duties as agents of the rebellion, their “master” (who is unnamed and has not been shown on screen as of the end of the episode), and other info-dump-type material that might be important to take in, but is difficult to pay enough attention to as one is trying to read everything on the screen. I eventually started pausing the video after a while to make sure that I could read all the character info (not a favorite thing to do; I prefer to take in episodes in real-time), only to find that it was all too easy to forget about everything immediately afterward. Could I tell you who most of the characters’ names were? Absolutely not. Though I do remember Napoleon, whose ridiculously boisterous and snooty personality arrives immediately like a fart and is the one character who manages to leave an impression. There’s also an American one whose visual motif includes stars, stripes (pink instead of red), and pigtails, and while he’s definitely one-of-a-kind in terms of character design his name completely escapes me.
Presented with no further comment.
There’s an attempt to lay out some character relationships throughout the episode, the most memorable of which are between a couple of weapons that were on opposing sides during the American Revolutionary war. The extent of the bickering (especially when the American one busts out an American flag and threatens to hang it up where they’re all bunking together) adds a little levity to what is otherwise pretty bland and frothy entertainment. To be honest, considering how things have been going lately in the US, anything that can make fun of how ridiculous we are here in a way that gets me to chuckle even mildly has earned a point in my book. One thing that wasn’t made especially clear and which may not matter that much (unless you’re a gun collector or historian) is whether or not the boys-who-are-guns are actually using the rifles in battle which they themselves represent. Since all the firearms, as little as they’re actually on screen, seemed different from one-another, I would speculate that the answer is yes (and perhaps that’s something appealing about the game on which this is based). I think it would have made an interesting aside or a cool illustration for the commercial break screens to provide some more information about that.
The rescue operation begins.
Because most anime is based at least partly on some sort of fantasy premise or at least asks the audience to accept things that differ from reality in various ways, one measure of a “good” anime in my book is its ability to suspend the viewer’s disbelief. I’m a little more liberal of an anime consumer than a lot of folks and tend to get really rankled when others start complaining about minor deviations from reality, especially when the series in question is full of supernatural nonsense, magical powers, or fantasy worlds. But occasionally I’ll get caught on a detail and I can’t let it go. In the case of this episode, we’re to believe that the characters are part of a rebel underground where they’re in hiding from the government and living in fear of being discovered. That’s fine and dandy, but there’s a goofy scene partway through where one character offers to make the others “honey crepes.” There’s an entire montage at the beginning of the episode that talks about nuclear devastation, and a lot of the other imagery implies that the quality of life in general has gone way downhill after the literal collapse of society. So where are these resistance fighters, who are, I remind you, living in a deteriorated bunker of some sort, getting things like honey, processed flour, eggs, or milk? Sweet stuff is typically a luxury item in times of scarcity, so I wonder just who their supplier is (though considering that their “master” can take guns and turn them into hot guys, perhaps it’s not that hard to believe they might have some way to produce it). I’d also love to know where they’re getting their clothing, considering that everyone else is practically dressed in rags. Also, how rifles where the user has to arm them with gunpowder and pellets by hand every time can take out soldiers that look like cyborg police. But that might be asking for too much realism.
Speaking of montages, there’s a comically-unconvincing training montage where the newer recruits prepare themselves to carry out the rescue mission. They’re show running through the forest with their guns in had (probably holding them in a manner which would irritate actual gun owners, I’d wager). I was actually taken aback by the fact that, half an episode in, we were already treated to such a goofy and cliche presentation device, but the more I think about it the more it seems appropriate for such a goofy show.
Despite my obvious eye-rolling towards this episode, I can’t say that I wasn’t entertained. Even if the entertainment value was mostly unintentional and based on the fundamental weirdness of the premise, I still don’t feel like my time was wasted. And if I had to choose between The Thousand Musketeers and Upotte!!, the female expression of a similar idea, you’d better believe I’d choose silliness over sexualization. If your tolerance level is higher than mine (or if you’re thirstier for a variety of bishounen characters, I suppose), this might provide some entertainment.
Pros: The premise is mildly educational in a silly sort of way. The episode uses its resources wisely, saving some of the nicer-looking animation for the action in the second half.
Cons: This episode is a confusing character dump of epic proportions. I have a hard time believing that an underground resistance movement could afford such luxuries as honey crepes and fancy outfits.
Ogikubo is the name of the specially designated area in space in the Milky Way where Earthlings and aliens can live together. Luluco is a female middle school student who lives with her father, and no matter where she is, Luluco is a common, “super normal” girl. As she is living her normal life, one day the mysterious transfer student ΑΩ Nova abruptly appears before her. That meeting will change Luluco’s fate. – ANN
Review:This review contains spoilers for events that occur throughout the series.
There’s a large sub-set of anime series that seem to trade primarily on their perceived “wackiness.” “Oh, those cartoons from Japan, they’re so weird,” people sometimes say, confused by somewhat by anime’s blending of cultural call-backs they’re not familiar with, referential comedy based on other media that will likely never be available in the West, and characters that don’t seem to reflect any real human attributes. Add to that the fact that so many shows nowadays, comedy series especially, arrive in such short, punctuated doses, here and gone in the blink of an eye, and it’s no wonder that many of these silly, colorful, and over-the-top anime are incredibly difficult to relate to (especially if you’re getting on in “fandom years” like me).
Luluco endures an awkward transformation into the Judgement Gun.
Short form anime seem to only be increasing in popularity and ubiquity, but until recently I just couldn’t fine many that I actually liked. It’s only been in the past couple of years or so that several short series have started to make decent use of their format and branch out from comedy into other realms, like Yamishibai‘s horror tales or She and her Cat‘s delicate look at life through a feline’s eyes. Still, comedy has primarily the format’s bread and butter over the years, and there have been several good ones lately. While many people have been trying to get me to watch Please Tell Me! Galko-chan (I’ll get around to it… someday), which I’ve heard called “Feminist” and “like Broad City, the anime,” I haven’t found myself in the correct frame of mind to tackle it yet. Those are both really large claims to make, and I’m afraid of ultimately being disappointed if/when it misses the mark. On the other hand, I had no trouble keeping up with Space Patrol Luluco from week-to-week, I think primarily because there’s some inherent part of me that just clicks with Hiroyuki Imaishi‘s body of work.
The anime that Imaishi has had a strong hand in tend toward the silly and perverse, with a lot of over-the-top movement and fiery, uncomplicated emotion. They can be both barely-animated in the same vein as many Western made-for-adults animation series tend to be, and jam-packed with cinematic, bombastic movement, within the same episode. Their subject matter could be silly, perverse, or grotesque, but with the ability to turn serious when needed or at least provide lip service towards exploring more complex topics. It’s like he walks into a project with a big old bag full of contradictory nonsense, and somehow has the ability to smash it all together into something visually appealing and entertaining to watch. I find that pretty fascinating.
Luluco is a sci-fi comedy anime that has Imaishi’s storytelling and directorial fingerprints all over it. It’s about a self-professed normal girl who wants to live an average teenage life. She worries about “teenage girl stuff” like finding her first love, getting along with others in school, and dealing with her dad. The twist is that she lives in an area called Ogikubo that’s a hotbed for alien activity where creatures from all across the local corner of the universe interact with one-another and occasionally cause trouble. Luluco’s dad is a member of the Space Patrol, an agency that sniffs out unlawful alien activity and “deals with it.” It’s when Dad “accidentally” eats some contraband material with his breakfast and freezes his body solid that Luluco is thrust into taking his place until he’s better. Goodbye, normal life! All is not lost, however, since with her is Alpha-Omega Nova, a very attractive boy her age that Luluco instantly starts crushing on. Chasing down criminal aliens and embarrassingly transforming into a giant gun aren’t so bad when you get to spend all your time allowing your first love to bud and flourish!
Lalaco Godspeed arrives to steal Ogikubo.
Eventually Luluco’s mom shows up (she’s a space pirate with a real rag-tag crew), steals Ogikubo itself and takes it to the far corners of the universe, and Luluco and company are sent on a mad chase to retrieve it, all the while discovering just how many truly goofy planets there are out there. Eventually Luluco’s very love for Nova-kun becomes a major plot point and the fate of Ogikubo and all its characters rests in what the big-bag refers to as a teenage girl’s “shitty, worthless first love.”
Imaishi seems to have a way with female anime characters and their stories. I wouldn’t necessarily call it feminist (those of you who have seen me in person at conventions lately know that there are reasons for that), but I do think that he and those who work with him seem to have more of a vested interest in presenting girls and women in a different light than you see in many anime. In Panty and Stocking (a series that generally seemed to confound a lot of fans), we get two main characters who are basically unapologetic about their “vices.” Panty has a lot of unattached sexual encounters, and Stocking eats sugary sweet food all day. Ultimately, I interpreted the series as a whole as being critical of these mostly unexamined prejudices that are held against women, both in the anime and in real life. In Kill la Kill, in the correct light, you can tease out messages about body shaming against women and the constant pressure we face to be dressed a certain way, as well as the value of female camaraderie and friendship. There are major issues with these anime series, too, which is partly why I’m hesitant about lifting them up as paragons of female-focused entertainment. They contain plenty of leering and fanservicey stuff to round out their run time (though I maintain that late-era “good” Gainax and Trigger material has a way with fanservice that I personally find less gross than the norm), so that’s something to consider.
Luluco close to death (from embarrassment?)
Luluco as a whole skews a bit younger with its characters. Its atmosphere, while appropriately zany and wacky, is a lot more tame in terms of the visual sexualization, so its handling of female-focused plot points comes across more purely than some of its predecessors. Ignoring the sci-fi element all together, the story is focused on the value of a young girl’s first love. This might not seem like particularly groundbreaking material, but consider that anime most often tackles this subject in the context of school drama where a young woman ends up becoming consumed with her feelings for the object of her affections to the exclusion of (most) everything else. The crush acts as both the focus of the plot, as well as an aspect of it which is used by outsiders and naysayers to trivialize the type of anime made for a young female audience. I knew someone at one time who called shoujo anime something like “those pointy-chin shows” referring to the types of character designs that tend to show up in those series. Getting beyond the fact that it’s kind of a funny term and there are a lot of mediocre shoujo anime (like any other type of anime) out there that kind of deserve it, I find that there are a lot of viewers who generally just trivialize anime series that have too strong a focus on feelings and emotions, and especially uncomplicated-yet-overwhelming pubescent romantic feelings, ostensibly because they find themselves unable or unwilling to try to relate to those emotions of the teenage girls who serve as protagonists.
There’s a lot to unpack there, but what amuses me about Luluco is that it does so without hesitation and without looking back… you just have to be paying attention to notice it. Luluco lays its aesthetics on thick with its bright colors, cutesy characters, madcap comedy, and constant parody humor, not to mention its lightning-fast pacing and Inferno Cop style plot progression. Luluco’s girlish crush on Nova-kun seems like a side note for most of the series, a gag that keeps cropping up that serves to re-emphasize just how bland of a personality he has. It’s only near the end of the show when the big baddie is revealed that we find out how central Luluco’s feelings were the entire time. The Blackholeians, who make their living stealing valuable items throughout the universe, have decided that it would be more interesting to start seeking out things that are considered utterly worthless. They’ve now come to the conclusion that the first love of a teenage girl is probably the most utterly worthless, most bland and most insignificant thing out there, so they steal it (visually represented by a clear heart-shaped jewel) from Luluco, killing her. Luluco then has to journey back from Hell itself to then prove the true value of her feelings.
The essence of Luluco’s pure and innocent first love.
I was incredibly impressed by this final story arc because within the microcosm of an otherwise very silly show, the creators were able to express a frustration that I’ve had with almost every kind of fandom I’ve ever been in – “this thing you care about isn’t important to me, so therefore it doesn’t matter.” Doubly-so when said by male fans when referring to entertainment targeted towards girls and women. Thinking back, I don’t think there are many people who would look at their first crush or even their early relationships, and think to themselves “this was substantial and it was made to last.” There are so many factors, including physiological ones and those relating to experience and emotional maturity, that generally doom these early relationships to be nothing more than learning experiences on the road to adulthood. But they were real and they were important, and at the time they felt all-consuming. They had value in they way they helped form my adult self; thinking back to those memories, I can tell which relationships helped me learn to appreciate others’ hobbies (even if they weren’t my hobbies) and which ones caused me to let my personal boundaries deteriorate, setting me up for a long road towards learning to respect myself again. There were happy times and challenging experiences. Sometimes there was more bad than good, but even if the emotions themselves were fleeting and over dramatic, they were always real and they were always important. Some of the same things could be said for the books, movies, television, blogs, or games that drew our attention as younger people. Some of them might have less objective “value,” and looking at them now we can tell that they were pretty terrible (I used to be in love with so much terrible anime, you guys), but people don’t attach themselves to fandoms and media for no reason; there’s always something there that speaks to us when we need to hear it.
When Luluco comes back from Hell and takes full ownership of her feelings for Nova, it’s then that she proves her power. Because there is nothing more emotionally powerful than being able to fully value one’s self and one’s emotions, at least as far as defeating black hole aliens is concerned. I like to interpret Luluco’s powerful return as a giant middle finger towards those who under-value entertainment made for women, especially since the message was stealthed into a show that from the outside seems to be nothing more than a cracked-out (and possibly a little bit self-congratulatory) comedy romp from Studio Trigger and company.
Luluco gets advice from a friend.
All that aside, there are some fun references to other Trigger properties throughout the series – Little Witch Academia, Kill la Kill, and Sex & Violence with Machspeed being the really obvious ones; Inferno Cop shows up in an awesome cameo later on and there are some strong aesthetic references towards Gurren Lagann, too. I would also be remiss if I went without mentioning the third member of the Space Patrol team, Midori, an alien gyaru who starts as sort of a love-rival to Luluco but ends up becoming supportive (though no less sassy) by the end. She’s used more as comic relief and provides a good foil for the pure-hearted Luluco, but unfortunately doesn’t spend much time front-and-center. Luluco’s mother, Lalaco Godspeed, is also a hoot (with prominent hooters, eheheh). The only downside is that the short format means that these fun side characters don’t really receive as much attention as I would have liked, but maybe there’ll be a sequel someday.
I’ve been a little bit snarky in person with some folks this past season, calling this “Studio Trigger’s good Spring 2016 anime series.” I’m only partly joking when I say that, though, since as much as I thought Kiznaiver was a decent accomplishment with a lot of good ideas to share, I felt a stronger emotional connection with this series. Luluco just always seemed more focused on the story it wanted to tell and on the character it decided to feature in the telling. Its entire run time only constitutes about 1/3rd of your average anime series, and yet I think it was more successful in arguing for its central conceits than a lot of other series out there. I may even have shed a tear once or twice (whether from laughing or crying, I’ll never tell). I have a tendency to dig deep into shows that I really enjoy, drawing conclusions that others might not agree with, and I gather that’s the case with this show, too. But they’re my feelings, and those feelings have power for me. And isn’t that really what’s important?
Pros: The show has a definite sense of style to it, with cute character designs, and a good balance of stills and more animated portions. I thought most of the gags were pretty funny and enjoyed the references to other anime throughout the show. There’s a good message to be found about the value of formative (and especially romantic) experiences, especially those that women have which are often belittled by the mainstream.
Cons: If you choose to seek out some of the anime referenced in the show, be warned that Sex & Violence with Machspeed is incredibly racy and grotesque, something that’s more hinted at in the episode of Luluco that references it. The short runtime leaves little time to flesh out some of the side characters, like Lalaco and Midori. Please make a sequel!
Naho Takamiya is a timid 16-year-old girl. One day, she receives a letter from her future self detailing actions she must take to prevent Kakeru Naruse, the new transfer student, from sinking into depression and taking his own life. – ANN
Summary of Episode 1: Naho is a sweet, quiet girl who aims to be the type of person who doesn’t cause trouble for those around her. That usually means allowing others to have what they want while keeping her desires and discomforts private. This begins to change one day when Naho receives a mysterious letter in the mail; the writer claims to be Naho herself, only 10 years in the future. In the letter are written instructions for how to approach the events of the coming days, especially as they relate to a new transfer student. Naho doesn’t know whether to believe the letter or not until the events of her school day line up exactly with what is written. The Naho of 10 years from now seems to harbor several regrets about things that happened during high school. As the next several weeks unfold, Naho begins to strengthen her resolve. Is it only coincidence that her feelings for Kakeru, the new transfer student, begin to blossom into romantic feelings?
First Impressions: I’m admittedly not going into this anime with zero knowledge or expectations. A few months ago I overheard a friend of mine talking about the Orange manga, and since it’s available in full on Crunchyroll (if you’re a subscriber), I decided to give it a look. The fact that I read the entire series in one go over the period of a couple hours should do enough to express how compelling I thought the story was. Needless to say, when I found out that an anime adaptation was in the works, I was pretty jazzed. I’ve been excitedly anticipating this premiere since then.
Kakeru, the new transfer student, is conveniently assigned to sit next to Naho.
So what is it that makes this series more interesting than the glut of melodramatic shoujo manga adaptations that are floating around out in anime land? Speaking from the perspective of a manga reader (though hopefully without spoiling anything), I think there are quite a few interesting things at play in this story. For one thing, this isn’t really just a shoujo-style romance played straight. It’s got some unique cross-demographic origins that were a little bit surprising to me when I learned of them – the story was serialized in both a shojo (girls’) magazine, then later in a seinen (adult men’s) one. There’s also a very subtle sci-fi mechanic as far as Naho’s “letter from the future” is concerned, and the story is able to maintain its own internal logic well enough to keep that bit from being too goofy (time travel is rarely done well in fiction and I’m personally fine with that, but this series does well by not getting overly explanatory with the concept). What I think is most important, though, and very evident already from this episode of the anime, is that, even though the story ends up becoming an ensemble piece, a very large part of the story is Naho’s growth as a human being. That to me is way more engrossing than a bunch of dry sci-fi concepts with some characters pasted over the top.
The way Naho behaves in this episode, especially her inner monologue while she and her friends are deciding which kind of bread they want (Naho likes curry bread the best, but she defers to others when asked which kind she’d like to have), and also the way she tends to deny herself the experience of doing things she’d really like to do (because it might make her friends uncomfortable or draw too much attention to herself), cuts like a knife. Those types of feelings and emotions are so familiar to me that it immediately imbues this series with a type of realism that would otherwise be difficult to establish in so short a time. It’s fairly common practice to give shoujo manga heroines some sort of quirky trait in order to try and humanize them a bit – while I think the concept of a “Mary Sue” is terribly sexist since male characters often aren’t examined through the same critical lens, it’s also admittedly not very interesting to watch a character who is already powerful and completely capable with no flaws whatsoever (I’ve never been one for hero worship). So a heroine who is attractive and smart but also has some personality flaw or dirty little secret is pretty common. It also serves as an easy source of comic relief – think Yukino Miyazawa and her secretly-slobbish nature, or Haruhi Fujioka‘s plot-convenient gender fluidity. But Naho’s character flaw, her self-denial, is expressed with a lot of care and doesn’t manifest itself in an over-the-top way. It’s not a source of comedy, but instead serves to underscore the exact situation that the Naho-of-the-future hopes to avoid – the regretful experiences of her high-school life. It feels very genuine to me.
Kakeru trades his curry bread for Naho’s melon bread.
Knowing that this is a story that relies a lot on its emotional content, I was really hoping that the first episode would start off on the right foot in that respect. For the most part I would say that it hits the right beats from the first few chapters of the manga, although there are a couple of aesthetic choices that I personally wouldn’t have made. The episode leans heavily on its use of visual montage to tell certain parts of the story, and while it gets done what it needs to do (showing a lot of action that takes place over a long period of time in a very short period of screen time, obviously), it adds an element of “wackiness” that seems a bit out of place. Knowing what I do about the general plot arc, this could be a ploy on the director’s part to throw off the audience, but it’s difficult for me to tell at this point. Likewise, the soundtrack tends to be a a bit goofy and overbearing in some scenes, which I think provides the wrong impression. While there are lighthearted moments, the most prominent mood I think should be conveyed is bitter-sweetness; uptempo, noisy music in the background takes away from my ability to feel that. On the other hand, there are a couple points in the episode where there are some really interesting visual filters in use (there’s a scene near the beginning where young Naho and adult Naho symbolically cross paths, and the image is given a hazy, over-saturated and otherworldly quality), and there’s some good use of framing that’s utilized to keep the focus on what’s important (namely, Naho herself). The visual composition of the series is clearly very competent and manages to use some flashy tricks in a more subtle and refined way. I like it.
It’s pretty rare for me to have read a manga before its anime adaptation is available (normally it’s the other way around since I’m primarily an anime fan with manga as a side interest), so to have so many concrete expectations for this adaptation is somewhat foreign. I can get a little disparaging towards manga fans when they get upset over anime adaptations that stray from their source material. It’s experiences like this which provide me with some much-needed perspective. People become critical of adaptations, not generally out of a need to complain or poo-poo on others’ parades, but out of love for the source material itself. When a story grabs hold of your heart and remains rooted within you long after you’re finished experiencing it, an adaptation which falls far short of its source material can almost feel like a personal insult. But an adaptation is also someone else’s interpretation of a story, and it can really pay off to balance one’s own desires for how that story should play out with the requirements of a different medium and the strengths, weaknesses, and varying tastes and interpretations of the person doing the adapting. It’s definitely something that I’ll have to keep in mind as this story plays out. Luckily, the first episode gives the strong impression that this story is in good hands.
Pros: The story is one that should resonate with multiple demographics pretty easily, as its themes and multi-generational cast have mass appeal. The visuals are high-quality and there is good use of scene framing and modern animation effects.
Cons: Some of the music gets a little overbearing at times. There is a heavy use of montage in this episode which comes across as cheesy.
