#240: Starship Troopers (1988)

Studio: Sunrise

Director: Tetsurō Amino

Screenplay: Tsunehisa Ito and Shō Aikawa

Based on the novel by Robert A. Heinlein

Voice Cast: Yasunori Matsumoto as Juan "Johnnie" Rico; Akira Kamiya as Sgt. Charles Zim; Hirotaka Suzuoki as Greg Patterson; Kazuhiko Inoue as Alphard "Kitten" Smith; Masahiro Anzai as Cherenkov; Mika Doi as Captain Yvette Deladrier; Rei Sakuma as Carmencita Ibañez; Saeko Shimazu as Claire; Shingo Hiromori as Sgt. Dunn

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

I think you can sum up why few may know of the first adaptation of Robert A. Heinlein's 1959 sci-fi novel, a six part animated straight-to-video production from the legendary Japanese studio Sunrise no less, from watching what is in some episodes the opening credits animation or the end credits one. It is of Carmencita, the lead female character and love interest for Johnnie Rico, the good old son from New Buenos Aries joining the Mobile Infantry, frolicking on the beach contrasted by a song sung in English called WE CAN MAKE IT by Tsunoda☆Hiro, with her even turning into a seagull at some point between constantly cutting to the avian figure multiple times flying. Nothing perfectly encapsulates Heinlein's tale of Earth protecting itself in the far future from giant insects than an inspiration eighties Japanese lounge song of believing yourself and jump cut transmogrification into another species.

Starship Troopers is a work I really know from Paul Verhoeven's 1997 film adaptation, which you need to take with a pinch of salt as it is the result of the transgressive Dutch filmmaker attempting to read the novel itself, hating it and giving up part of the way through, and the final film reflecting an unfaithful adaptation and a deliberate sabotage of the source's ideals¹. It is an epic which I was allowed to get away with seeing at a much more early age than one probably should, appreciated then as a sci-fi fiction spectacle from the time, and still admired as an adult. When I became an adult too, it was also so visible that a layer of satire, and even loading in fascist readings of the human characters, was there all alone adding to the fun of the film. For me, you cannot hate a film with the line "I'm from Buenos Aires and I say kill them all!", but neither is this a faithful Starship Troopers adaptation, though the straight-to-video sequels attempted to move past the humour. More appropriate for a teenager was Roughnecks: Starship Troopers Chronicles (1999-2000), a CGI animated series which, just going from hazy memory, was an ambitious and admirable attempt at a serious sci-fi work, with a continuing narrative and even legitimately dangerous stakes for its cast, one I was glad to also see at this time and I have always wished to return to. Sunrise's adaptation though, even next to Verhoeven's, is weird in that until the sixth episode, you never get a proper moment of Rico, our lead, in the battlefield, whilst most of the show is a science fiction tale of learning to adapt to being in the army, not Starship Troopers' main story.

This is weirder as Starship Troopers presents an important influence on anime. Only seen in the third film in the live action adaptations, 2008's Marauder, the novel includes personal combat suits, giant robots for individuals to pilots, arguably among the earliest in science fiction. Those suits, and how publications of the source novel in Japan had illustrations of them designed, have a legitimate claim to having influenced a certain section of anime science fiction when it came to designs for personal combat suits², which makes Sunrise's decision to adapt the book at this time for them enticing to consider how it could have gone differently. Starship Troopers the anime (not to be confused with Shinji Aramaki's Starship Troopers: Invasion (2012) and Starship Troopers: Traitor of Mars (2017)) is a surprise in how the power suits and combat with the extraterrestrial threat in this adaptation is kept to about a minimum in favour of a story of Rico's progression through the Mobile Infantry to being combat ready, which is an acquired taste for taking up most of this three hour narrative altogether.

It is compelling, mostly because I have had such a low bar of expectation to this mini-series when I first heard of it. It is fascinating as this mix of almost light hearted drama, in which Rico and his band of miscreant fellow soldiers, from one with headphones always on to another obsessed with a nude photo of his older girlfriend he keeps with him, try to survive through the gruelling training with the Mobile Infrantry and try their hardest, only to cut to how Buenos Aires is attacked by the alien menace, leading to loss in Rico's family, or when cast die. The opening and ending songs, also one called BELIEVE by Tsunoda☆Hiro, also include animation set to Rico against the cosmos like a space exploration yearning towards the deep space, which does not suggest the peril of war which the source was about. Even Paul Verhoeven's piss take was, on the surface, an epic science fiction action film full of action that could still be appreciated for that. Able to get away with the gore it had alongside his interest in sexuality and brazen vulgarity, the bug menace in that film could decimate and render a human being into pieces, and the spectacle even with nineties CGI needing to be used is still impressive decades on.

The one sense of threat is in how, deciding against the bug aliens of the novel, these aliens are freakish in a credible way in their anime interpretation. Like crustacean, or something from the bottom of the sea, mixed with living pink bacterium, they are freakish and compelling as a truly alien form, which to travel in space (and even create their "bases" of operations) form together into mass of pink entity and can split off, including latch pieces onto human ships to than attack innocents on Earth. There is, as a result, enough here even as a lower budgeted production to have made this more of an action or intergalactic work, but instead emphasis was placed on the drama. This feels less like a compromise, or that this show was cancelled before it could progress, but a deliberate choice. This choice is going to make the show off-putting for some, simply because most of the 1988 Starship Troopers is a military training drama which, in context of its world and source, is a mistake for only three hours of a work, even if the scenes of contemplation or Rico being back on Earth, even fighting with local ruffians at a bar, were entertaining for me at least if for no one else.

I found it interesting in spite of this, even if details of the show do show a foot forward was not always the best in other areas as well, such as how, whilst the figure who keeps Rico strong, Carmencita was unfortunately drawn with eyes that can burn holes into people even when she is relaxed. Without the dramatic tension this animated work eventually brought in with the vast number of aerial combat scenes still within it too, what this feels like was Sunrise were taking a page from what Area 88 (1985-6) did perfectly, in terms of emphasising the human drama first, but here with the scene that it takes too much of the adaptation, even if I respect what this is as a strange curiosity. This is stranger knowing that half this series, arguably at some of the more interesting moments, is written by Shō Aikawa; infamous at one point for being the man penning the likes of Urotsukidôji to Violence Jack at this point, he became a well regarded screenwriter in the decades after, and he would have been the sort of person who would have cut to the chase and made this a more pulpy and dynamic work, alongside the virtues he showed as a writer in his career, with the sense here that was a choice left off the table.

The turnover between episodes, from October to December 1988³, also sadly suggests that the production was under the gun, undercutting the potential for the elaborate spectacle this adaptation could have provided. But this did not hurt anyone. This was just a script co-written by Shō Aikawa, who was working with Tsunehisa Ito, a prolific writer from anime before this adaptation as well such as Sherlock Hound (1984-5). Director Tetsurō Amino is prolific and would go on to his biggest work with Macross 7 as a franchise; starting with the 1994 TV series, this franchise entry, where music is literally the weapon in its take on the science-fiction and music from the Macross franchise, is one of the largest in quantity of material and did well. Sunrise is, well, Sunrise, prolific and making Gundam and non-Gundam shows and animation to the current day, and Robert A. Heinlein's source text, beyond the Paul Verhoven film, has had other adaptations even into video games. (There are the Shinji Aramaki anime films too, but that is for another day.) Suffice to say, no one lost any sleep about this barring the lost promise of an eighties hand drawn and lavish Starship Troopers adaptation from Sunrise, who were big even then, which is a disappointment. It is not going to cause me to lose sleep when, knowing this was the warning about this show, I came with nothing expectations and found joy here in spite of the creative decisions.

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1) Triple Dutch: Paul Verhoeven’s sci-fi trilogy, written Adam Smith and Owen Williams for Empire Online, published on February 12th 2014.

2) In Pursuit of the Powered Suit: The Class of '83, written by Sean O'Mara for Zimmerit, published on July 14th 2022.

3) Anime New Network's Episode listings for Starship Troopers.

#234: Sakura Diaries (1997)

 

Studio: Shaft

Director: Kunitoshi Okajima

Screenplay: Kenji Terada

Based on the manga by U-Jin

Voice Cast:

Japanese:

Kyoko Hikami as Urara Kasuga; Mitsuaki Madono as Touma Inaba; Mako Hyoudou as Koumi Natsuki; Rumi Kasahara as Meiko Yotsuba; Kunihiko Yasui as Tatsuhiko Mashu; Masa Saito as Touma's Mother; Masamichi Ota as Keisuke

English:

Lauren Worsham as Urara Kasuga; Mariela Ortiz as Urara Kasuga (2005 dub); Martin Burke as Touma Inaba; Robert Martinez as Touma Inaba (2005 dub); Monica Rial as Mieko Yotsuba (2005 dub); Rebecca Davis as Meiko Yotsuba

Viewed in English Dub

 

This sadly was a review, an act of revisiting an anime I saw when I was younger, where I found myself having completely forgotten most of the content, including how one dramatic choice can entirely capsize your production, a reminder of how something can go grossly wrong as an artistic choice, and ruin what sadly also had, even as an average sex comedy, moments of virtues. Sakura Diaries is a twelve episode series, yet it was released straight-to-video, all in spite of the fact that, even as an explicit sex comedy, it only once or twice ever uses the creative freedoms of the medium choice to be more sexually provocative, or even have actual nudity. The rest feels like a quieter comedy with dramatic moments and a lot of innuendo. Trying to get into college, a young guy from the country Touma Inaba fails the entrance exams to get into a university. When he falls for a red headed woman named Mieko Yotsuba, he claims he has passed into that prestigious university in a moment of panic and attraction to her. Wishing not to just damn Sakura Diaries, and instead present the sad minefield where a show can make one wrongheaded choice but still be interesting, it is that this aspect of the story becomes the most fascinating and having had the potential to grow into something inspired.

Namely that Touma, whilst a cliché of a young man protagonist who can be a pervert, also presents all the neurosis of someone in his position, that whilst the show has tone deaf and misogynistic choices, he is a fascinating character of a virginal young guy who is trying to get away from working in the family hot spring. Having fallen in love with Mieko, even if lying that he enter the most prestigious college in Tokyo, he has the desire to enter cram school so he can get into the college for real. His sex fantasies are lewd, sometimes inappropriate, but when the tone works, his flights of fantasy, about romance and losing his virginity, become comedic in how he has his heads in the clouds as much as in his pants, who is stuck masturbating to porn and admits he is neurotic of his inexperience that he would unsatisfying women like Mieko even in bed. Feeling Mieko is entirely out of his league, even his dreams about trying to succeed in cram school are interesting, in a tragically humoured way, in how his subconscious can cruelly make him dream he has failed the exam, even more cruelly making him believe he is awake and has passed to exams, or involve his sexual hang-ups, which are some of the most rewarding moments. Even the crass jokes about Touma realising his libido is preventing his studying, in this anxiety, is thoughtful for being blunt about this.

The facade of being in college is complicated as he is living with his young female cousin Urara Kasuga, who has clearly lied about her father being constantly away on business but managing to keep the lie one. This is something some will find icky, and Urara is viewed as the show's central icon of sexuality, but again with mind that this could have gotten to be a more thoughtful story, Sakura Diaries does have the set up to have been more dramatically complex than it does briefly have. Urara is already eccentric, if questionable, in her relationship with Touma, meeting him by pretending to be a sex worker upon the first time he has seen her grown up, soon into him living at her uncle's wearing only an apron when preparing a meal, all in what is her blatant attempts to attract him to her. In a show if it focused on this drama more than the moments it does, it would have been compelling as a tale of a cousin whose love for Touma comes from a tragic moment in her life, the passing of a close relative, which is complicated by the fact that the emotional dependency involved years on is not healthy for either of them. [Major Spoiler Warning] The ending, where she has to learn to have a broken heart as Touma moves out of the house, realising the relationship is not healthy for either, is a good ending in context for this. [Spoilers End] Mieko realises she herself is in an existential position, where the debonair guy in the college, obsessed with her and trying to undermine Touma, is someone with his own psychological baggage, but also when confronted by her is rightly damned for wanting to own her like a won prize. The drama here is compelling for that reason.

The problem is in the tone. Specifically, and this is why the review now has to come with a trigger warning, entirely for Episode Five where, after a drunken game of strip paper rock scissors, Touma suddenly becoming a violent figure who attempts to rape Urara before realising what he is doing. That, in mind to a show whose tone is soft, lightly coloured and gentle even as a lewd sex comedy, is the most abrupt and inappropriate tonal shift possible. It is ugly, it is unacceptable, and it makes it impossible to like Touma as a protagonist for good reason, especially as the show references this moment a few times over the last episodes rather than pretend it did not happen. It is an absolute disaster in terms of a dramatic choice. The surprising thing is that, if you look into what the source manga is, this one segment is just one moment in a show which entirely jettisoned what the tone was for the manga, which makes this creative choice even more cursed. Even though I do not what to criticise the manga or its author without having seen the source material, there was a lot of content which, if done wrong, would have been far worse than here.  

The Sakura Diaries manga is hentai, which is not a thing to criticise. What is more shocking is that, looking into synopsis on what content is within it, it has a lot of content which sounds absolutely tasteless and crass if it had been presented with the tone of Episode 5's misguided change into serious drama. That it includes Urara becoming pregnant, entering sex work with a friend, and an incident trying to swindle money from a client involving one of them being gang raped. Yes, that in itself does feel, especially for a hentai manga, legitimately uncomfortable to consider as working as good let alone acceptable storytelling. U-Jin, the source manga author, is unapologetically someone, looking at their career, which wrote transgressive content - some, depending on the tone, to kink shame, such as Vixens (1994), which involves BDSM and Omorashi (the arousal from wetting oneself), but other material as plot threads in Sakura Diaries, would dangerously skirt the line between offending people or if they managed to get the tone right. The tragedy is that, for one moment, Sakura Diaries the show makes one mistake with one storytelling choice, and thus ruins itself when it is, for the most part, a gentle comedy drama which, despite some dated sexual politics, had the right trajectory with its production.

It is a shame as, even with the crass sex comedy, of Touma lusting over women, the show is a mostly fluffy story whose drama in the end, accepting a romance that will not happen and growing up, is absolutely alien to its one tasteless shock moment. The opening and ending credits are light coloured and sweet, contrasted by two choices of songs which actually are good for this tone, the first an acoustic song which a gentle earworm. It is however with realisation, a perfect example here, of how one decision is able to capsize a story fully. It does evoke Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise (1987), a legendary science fiction theatrical anime which made as equally as misguided choice in sexual violence involving the main male protagonist. Honnêamise though, whilst not defendable and a decision which should have been excised in its production, was attempting a moment of great existentialism, a horrible mistake nearly done in a moment of exceptional world bearing crisis, leading to an existential enlightenment learning from this idiocy, even if again a scene which is rightly challenged as nearly capsizing Honnêamise's incredible achievements fully. Honnêamise is however also a film of such magnitude that, in its complexity, this problematic scene is still there and undermines it, but is a work dealing with such complexity on a psychological level, which can be grasped even if that artistic mistake is to be challenged. Sakura Diaries is a light hearted sex comedy, even for its emotional complexity, suddenly shows a horrible misogynistic side in how Touma acts to Urara before the sexual violence is even considered, never meant for real complexity even if misguided. It completely deflates Sakura Diaries fully even if the drama afterwards is interesting and of reward.

The odd thing is that no one on the production is really someone who should have known better. Kunitoshi Okajima, the director, was prolific in the animation side of anime productions the decade before, and screenwriter Kenji Terada, with this one of the last works of their career, had a long filmography beforehand, having penned for franchises including the original series of Kimagure Orange Road (1987-1988) as its key screenwriter. This is a very early production from Shaft as a studio, one which would grow and be prolific over the decades after, including being the home of Akiyuki Shinbo, who started helming productions there in the mid-2000s, and to the current day is his home, meaning they were the ones who brought his big hitters of the 2010s to life. If anything, this feels like an awkward stumble for the studio that, in this time, also brought about Arcade Gamer Fubuki (2002-3), a work with too many tasteless aspects to defend, even if there are grains of gold within it too.

Sakura Diaries, were it not for Episode 5's conclusion, would be an all right, if not perfect drama, one which could have been significantly better but has virtues. As it stands, including Episode 5, that is enough to put people off decades on, and it really emphasises how one mistake in tone, even over anime which is more openly lurid and tasteless, has a far worse influence when, here, there were virtues. The only thing I had remembered from this series originally when I had watched it, which is a tasteless moment, is that there is a scene where exchanging pubic hair is considered a good luck charm. It is something which comes from actual Japan belief¹, and is not a bad thing inherently in itself to include, but considering Touma emotionally bullies Urara into it to help him pass his exams, there is a streak of toxicity to the drama which does undermine its tone too. The English dub, one of two ADV Films recorded, and in the UK was the only language track they included in their DVD release for us, neither helps, not good and actually emphasising how, for every moment Touma does come off (if lecherous) as a sympathetic figure, there are so many scenes which do not work because they paint him as a detestable figure we are meant to sympathise with. Sakura Diaries' problems are more than one horrible drama choice, but that one choice does emphasis how this series failed to reach the virtues it occasionally clings to, which is heartbreaking to experience. This should have been a melodrama where the knife stabs into the viewer - like Touma going to karaoke with Meiko, only for Urara to have gone to the same one, with the pain where she lies about being his sister - not stab the viewer in a way that this has aged badly and destroys its own virtues at the same time.

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1) Japanese Lucky Charm: Pubic hair, written by Timothy Takemoto for Burogu on April 6th 2012

#220: The Skullman (2007)

 

Studio: Bones

Director: Takeshi Mori

Screenplay: Yutaka Izubuchi (with writing by Hiroshi Ohnogi, Seishi Minakami and Shingo Takeba)

Based on the manga by Shotaro Ishinomori

Voice Cast: Hiroshi Tsuchida as Skull Man; Makoto Yasumura as Hayato Mikogami; Ayako Kawasumi as Kiriko Mamiya; Fumiko Orikasa as Maya Kuroshio; Hiroyuki Yoshino as Akira Usami; Katsunosuke Hori as Kyouichirou Tachigi; Masayuki Katou as Yoshio Kanzaki; Toshiyuki Morikawa as Masaki Kumashiro; Tomokazu Seki as Tsuyoshi Shinjou

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Skullman was created in 1970 as a one shot by the legendary manga author Shotaro Ishinomori, and in that text, including an expanded 1998-2001 manga by Kazuhiko Shimamoto with Ishinomori's contributions, the character was always an anti-hero, making this 2007 anime series not a bleak interpretation of a bright tokusatsu like character, but apt for the figure even if its own story. Skullman the series works as an interpretation in how the series is entirely around the titular figure, but for most of it, he is not the central character, instead a mystery in its centre of who he is and what his motives are, a mystery which will expand further on from this even when these two questions are answered in this interesting genre hybrid.

Set in an alternative world, where Japan is caught in a civil war, our protagonist is actually reporter Hayato Mikogami, who wishes to go to Ōtomo City, his place of birth and one caught in a tense political situation in terms of the ongoing war, with the intention of discovering who the urban myth of the Skullman is, the figure said to be behind the series of seemingly random murders of men and women in the city. Even in the opening credits, Skullman is first depicted as a monster, seemingly killing innocents, his first victim being a woman whose death is shot like a thriller not without purpose for hinting at this. Soon it becomes apparent, however, his mission, whilst at times edging to unjustifiable, is part of a more problematic conspiracy, much more dangerous to the world, and all circling all the victims seemingly being connected to the White Bell Association, a small religion entirely within Ōtomo City only that has a grip on the town and is very cultish. With Kiriko, a young woman who manages to wriggle her way into Hayato's life against his will, the pair finds themselves in a show where that, with only thirteen episodes to work with, does a stupendous job in using all thirteen economically to tell this tale.

There would be no time to have tangents or filler, but the production and writing team's credit, this manages to tell this story concisely, with a plot with juggles many genres which could not work, and manages to still have a unique personality, even humour of a cartoonish form at times. One of the twists, which it early on and really not a spoiler, is very reminiscent of Yoshiki Takaya's The Guyver, in which people are being turned into monsters, and the show is also a noir-tinged work of mystery, of drama, yet with a titular character who stands out, despite his anti-hero origins, influenced by tokusatsu action characters. It's tone is really idiosyncratic just from the opening, heavily leaning on the horror mood until one of the most curious opening tracks can be heard begins, jazz with funky layers, but the trumpet playing at a very odd time to the rest of the rhythm, or the backup vocals, whilst yet managing to work. One key character, an older man named Kyouichirou Tachigi who to Hayato seemingly knows everything, is a cool character but as much because of delightfully odd touches, like finding him fishing near the White Bell's church location, or that he is not only a man capable of handling himself, but within one scene revealed as a coffee aficionado who knows his obscurer blends in a coffee shop greatly.

The series composition was by Yutaka Izubuchi, with screenplay help from collaborators, and what is fascinating is that he is far more prolific as a mecha and character designer, with only a few screenplay credits in his prolific. This fact makes it to his credit and the other collaborators - Hiroshi Ohnogi, Seishi Minakami and Shingo Takeba - how good and interesting The Skullman's story is. The Skullman is a show whose episode titles are long, poetic and bleak, and Frederick Nietzsche is referenced and becomes a dialogue point between Hayato and Father Yoshio Kanzaki, a Christian priest who Hayato knows fondly from their youths. Until it gets completely serious, there is even exaggerated humour which fits the tone, such as a scene with food leading to characters having giant bellies, or the character of policeman Tsuyoshi Shinjou, who dogs Hayato believing him to be a suspect. That does not factor in, even very early in the show, the violence whether with the monsters or more conventional means which is still bloody and nasty. It manages as a curious tight walking act to all work, and it is a pulpy feat.

The Guyver comparison is apt, as in mind to spoilers, this involves alien artefacts, people being turned into monsters, against their will or willingly, and a conspiracy that involves a group very obviously connected to it, but there is more in just thirteen episodes which elaborates beyond this. Of government conspiracies, of an illegitimate son fostering contempt, of politicians being murdered by the Skullman which are more sobering to consider decades after, and that this is set in a war, one where a foreign group, even with the cartoonish super villain name of Brain Gear, are here to exploit the climate. With weapons that can literally disintegrate people, they are their own entity off to the side, in a show which pays a huge tribute to Shotaro Ishinomori by having characters and references based on his entire career, where there is a religious cult involved, and a far right imperialist Japanese group who wish to militarise and get hold of nukes, planning to stage a coup de trait even against the corrupt police force. The Skullman, as a result, also taps into some real politics even as a genre piece, which makes its ability to tell this all well even against monsters and a sci-fi plot more a further credit.

The Skullman's ending was open to a second season, even if a bleak turn, with characters becoming figures from Shotaro Ishinomori's Cyborg 009, yet still works as a conclusion in striking a balance between the tragedy that ends it, when a figure has their spirit crushed and becomes a weapon of the true villains, and the hope with the characters who have survived. There are a few side characters, and they are all interesting, be it Kyouichirou, a mysterious brother and sister revealed to be test subjects who can control their monster forms, Tsuyoshi, or even the daughter of a major political figure who acts as the voice of the White Bell Association, a frail and sympathetic figure clearly in love with Yoshio Kanzaki, transgressing her mother's views of talking to religious heretics by helping at his orphanage for children.

Even one off figures are interesting, such as episode ten introducing a troop of soldiers, from a war Yoshio was a front-line minister of rites on, who have been turned by cyborg killing machines by Brain gear, a sense of tragedy at hand just with one of them, unstable even for his peers, traumatised by not being called by his real name and a shell now giving dangerous access to a missile launching rig. The Skullman staying on path through its plot means there is not a lot of filler, its curious tangents all leading to a finale, all done with reward, with all characters getting a conclusion even if a bleak one. Even the fact there will be more than one Skullman is not worth marking as a spoiler as, without explaining detail, it comes instead as part of the really good dramatic turns of the show, actual drama even in the midst of a show as proudly a violent tokusatsu monster show with gore, with the downfall for one in sacrificing his soul for saving other, the other broken as a person whilst Ōtomo City turns into chaos in the final episodes, full on the streets of fanatics turning into monsters, a doomsday scenario being prepared for, and a coup de trait or two also transpiring.

It is an exceptional show, one that does stand out as being idiosyncratic as a sombre action take finds the balance between the genre touches fully, feeling adult without being contrived and manages to be serious even with explicitly fantastical touches. It was a title suddenly released in the United Kingdom in 2022 from MVM, a DVD only title for another curious touch, having been a Sentai Filmworks release in the United States before. Suddenly coming here decades after its first release adds something special as, clearly, this was worth release for all its virtues. It feels like a title very different from the type of anime show usually released, back then and still now, something very idiosyncratic and fantastic.

#183: She, the Ultimate Weapon (2002)

 

a.k.a. Saikano

Director: Mitsuko Kase

Screenplay: Itaru Era

Based on the manga by Shin Takahashi

Voice Cast: Fumiko Orikasa as Chise; Shirou Ishimoda as Shuji; Miki Itō as Fuyumi; Shinichiro Miki as Tetsu; Tetsu Shiratori as Atsushi; Yuu Sugimoto as Akemi; Atsushi Ii as Kawahara

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

[Major Plot Spoilers Throughout]

Returning to She, the Ultimate Weapon it is amazing to think of how heavily publicized this show was especially in the United Kingdom for its release. A big license for Manga Entertainment, it has effectively disappeared despite also having a lot of praise for it at the time. Whilst this may be odd considering so many anime having these tropes and plot threats this has, She... is also quite a peculiar animated series in hindsight, which in itself becomes part of why it still clings with something of note for me and likely why the tide turned to its obscurity.

Set in a coastal city of Hokkaidō in Japan, this is set up like a conventional anime romance. A shy young woman, technically a teenager but older than most in other stories, named Chise is clumsy and awkward but is lovable. She finally gets the courage to date Shuji, a reserved seventeen year old boy in her school, and they blossom immediately together. She... is however a war story, set in a world where Japan is at war. The touch, adding to the strangeness of how the story is told, which stands out is that this entirely focuses on the world of these characters rather than focusing on the war. We see the battlefield in Japan, soldiers fighting on their own soil in an invasion, and the aftermath, but the show is entirely focused on the effect of the war on the ordinary people from the soldiers to the leads, living in Hokkaidō. This is also a science fiction show where Chise is also a figure of great importance to protect Japan, which is bizarre for an outsider to consider, of a story of a teenager being the ultimate weapon, expect that anime and manga have always had teenagers in war stories like this, as much to appeal to the emotions of a target audience as an obsession to have youthful characters, so we fans accept the logic.

The strangeness and uniqueness is the tone. Completely sober, a lot of the world is never explained. An spin off OVA called Saikano: Another Love Song (2005) explained more detail to why Chise is the titular weapon, in a side story on another human weapon, but in the series we learn little context. We never learn what the war is, with only a few of the opposite side as actual human beings seen, and the war itself is ultimately an apocalyptic one. Chise's use in the war, whilst conventional in any other narrative, emphasises this as she herself is literally the weapon, with body horror tropes that she can even produce heat seeking missiles from her body even against her will which can be painful. The sombreness of the narrative, and how little is explained on the science fiction plot, emphasises the distinct way the show is told, a tragedy where from the get-go the show's subtitle "The Last Love Song on This Little Planet" emphasises that this will become a bleak show in terms of humanity, once mysterious earthquakes hit the country and Chise herself becomes more inhuman to the point she can accidentally obliterate whole cities from existence.

The show does have some levity - even some cartoonish distortion of the characters when Chise and a soldier named Testu she befriends decide to have a day out away from work, including liberal attitudes to going "shopping" by blowing doors open - but this is melodramatic and tragic to an extreme. Eventually by Episode 9, titled after a side character named Akemi, Chise and Shuji's tomboy friend who becomes the latter's consciousness, this show is ill-advised to binge for how bleak it gets. This tone is one of the more divisive aspects of She... as it has no qualms even beforehand of emotional gut punches over and over in-between its very quiet dramatic tone and moments of war which, never depicted as action scenes, are dramatic in their pointlessness. Some of it in hindsight is ridiculous - in mind to how this type of scene makes some viewers uncomfortable, having Shuji slap Akemi twice in the series in a moment of emotional distress is absurd if likely to upset viewers. Some of it is heightened with an appropriate tone, befitting a show where you have to accept this premise of a seventeen year old girl with robot wings as the ultimate doomsday weapon.

The people behind the show are worth looking into to think about the series. A rare female director, Mitsuko Kase has mostly a career of Episode Directors and other positions on projects, but she has been at the helm of a couple of titles. That you have a female director on this project does cause one to think of how she would handle this material very differently from someone else. In mind to this, if this is the same figure and there is no confusion by accident between two people, screenwriter Itaru Era has also worked with Takeshi Miike, of all people to hire for this project also the figure who has worked with him sporadically over the years including on Visitor Q (2001). A notorious film in Miike's career, it is however also a reinterpretation of Teorema (1968), a subversive Pier Paolo Pasolini film, which means Visitor Q is not just a film notorious for having disturbing taboo scenes of incest and breast milk but a social critique. I cannot help but think, in particular with the screenwriter, that She, The Ultimate Weapon was much more carefully built that it may suggests, especially with mind to someone whose career has been focused on a lot of genre and pulp narratives, deciding to bleed them into a much more idiosyncratic narrative.

Some of it falls into the history of the animation studio which created it as well. Studio Gonzo, even before financial struggles eventually kneecapped them in 2009, is a divisive studio from when they started in 2000. At least for Western anime fans, when I got into anime in the early 2000s and companies like Manga Entertainment but especially ADV Films released many Gonzo releases in the United Kingdom. Gonzo has some titled held as gems - particularly the experimental Alexandre Dumas adaptation Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo (2004) - but alongside titles which never succeeded, they had a few where how they were told and put together became divisive. Some was bad luck, as they adapted titles where they could not finish them as the manga were ongoing (Chrno Crusade and Hellsing) and had to improvise anime exclusive narratives. Others, like Trinity Blood (2005), were just shows which (least to my younger self's eyes) merely fell hard over a long stretch of episodes. She, The Ultimate Weapon is a fascinating title, but one where I completely understand an individual viewer being divided between the moments where it succeeds as a risk in storytelling but also can be both manipulative and as awkward as its leads. It befittingly has a premise about a young woman, shy and innocent, struggling with a sinister dehumanising weapon part of herself now, and about a boyfriend who is the same age and not as mature as he thinks he is, as that is a perfect metaphor for a show which has tenderness and yet also so much darkness. One with characters dying with ease and an ultimately hopeless scenario for the war, exaggerated with the naive earnestness of teen leads in how it emphasises the one true love of one's life, something which may cause viewers to roll their eyes, but also with complete sincerity to it.

At least the show also does not beat around the bush too. It does have these characters be imperfect. Chise is a stereotype, but appropriate a person stuck in a horrible position where she can obliterate so many with ease, mandatory for the military. Shuji is not perfect, and in a subplot, with an older woman he had a crush on as a child comes into his life, there is the danger of him breaking Chise's heart as appropriate angst ridden rather than the show being sleazy, more of him being tragically controlled by lusts when the dehumanisation of Chise physically has an influence. The bluntness of the show to eventually be more than platonic love, but also a physical love between the leads, is a damn sight better than a childish one most characters can have in other anime, with no fan service but eventually a consummated romance. This is surprising rare in anime even if this one has many unsettling aspects surrounding it, not least when the woman you love's arm falls off just beforehand and she is clearly not human anymore.

Another factor, which is merely hindsight, is the look of the show. Tragically, time has changed a lot, so an early digital animated work like She... looks of its era. Neither helping is that, whilst there was progression in sound (such as 5.1. stereo which became a huge thing for Manga Entertainment licenses on DVD), this is in standard definition, which still does not mean not watching the show, but together means the show was struggling with limitations even for an animated show avoiding action sci-fi narrative tropes. This was actually an early title in Gonzo's history, and this becomes obvious to see again even if, thankfully, there is style of its own. It tries in spite of this, helped considerably by the character designs adapted from the source material, softer in features and almost even for the adult characters more likely to evoke a happier story, one which intentionally feels against the tragedy of the show's progressing narrative. The music as well, both composer Takeo Miratsu with various versions of the main theme but also the ending song Sayonara by Yuria Yato, really adds a lot of sincere emotional weight to the show too that is admirable. It is hilarious, adding to the curious history of the show, the composer for a Violence Jack OVA, Hell's Wind (1990), can progress to such a good score based on love and tragedy, but sadly they have not done a lot in their career either. Mostly working in the OVA era, if this was one of the last projects before retirement, it was a great way to bow out and defy expectations.

Returning to this series, as I got into She, The Ultimate Weapon when it was released in the United Kingdom, the obvious point of interest now revisiting the series was its ending. She... to its credit, least for this viewer, has characters that I was connecting to. Even the emotional gut punches could have been worse, though there is a reason this review from the get-go has huge spoiler warnings. The narrative even for a character like Akemi, very likable but with an entire episode dealing with the awful deathbed conclusion, is at least aware to give these moments the time for these characters' sake. The show for me became notorious in my mind, instead, for all these years for how unexpectedly it ends.  

When I said apocalyptic, I was not joking, as this ultimately does become The Last Love Song on This Little Planet. How this comes about in the final episode is still to this day the exclamation mark for how peculiar the show, for good and bad, is. When I first watched this show, engaged with it, the ending did enrage me and to this day, I can still see why. She... is definitely a show that could only work in the heightened, melodramatic world of anime and manga especially with having to make this look credible, something I wonder of now learning a 2006 live action film from Japan exists but has likely disappeared from existence. Even when the obvious is there, that Chise is literally turning into an immortal weapon of God-like power, what happens in pace is perplexing. Even if you see the obvious metaphorical concept not meant to be explained, that the war as a global one that ultimately destroys humankind is there to emphasise the stakes of the central romance, you have to try to depict this and everything ends quickly in the midway of the final episode. The sky is red like this will turn into The End of Evangelion (1997), with Chise apparently now with mechanical tentacles independent of her in the sky, and the world literally being washed away, the earthquakes throughout the series never directly connected to anything in the war or Chise herself. Gonzo is a studio I will evaluate as time goes, but I can immediately see how they developed the notoriety they had for titles for good and bad, stumbling to their finales with an erratic nature, and She... lunges into the world being plunged into total end as abruptly as you can get.

The ending still works, with a bittersweet one, even if the outcome if left open to what will happen to our leads, or that there is some vagueness, such as the possibility this is all due to Chise deciding to kill everything else, something which if the case is definitely vague in its depiction. [Manga Spoiler]] Thankfully, they did not follow the manga by having Chise left as a giant spaceship with Shuji the last human being, though that might have been fascinatingly weird to see animated. [Spoilers End]. If anything, it does emphasise that whilst this is truly a show to divide viewers on its virtues or lack of, I wish She, The Ultimate Weapon was critically evaluated as an example of when anime takes risks. If Gonzo's back catalogue was sadly full of bland titles, which ultimately left them as a studio still in existence today but with less of their status as back then, that would a sad conclusion. Thinking back to when I drifted to Japanese animated television away from Western shows however, live action and otherwise, She... still emphasises why I did as even this deeply imperfect show is taking risks in tone and its curious genre mixing I have to admire. It is a mess in hindsight, but a fascinating one to see again as an adult. One I cannot help but still admire and even, honestly, feel an attachment to. Obviously, nostalgia to seeing this title has to be admitted, as I saw it at an impressionable time. At the same time however, I thankfully liked a show whose actual content even today is very unconventional and still rewarding.

#181: Submarine 707R (2003)

 

Director: Shoichi Masuo

Screenplay: Hiroshi Ohnogi

Based on the manga by Satoru Ozawa

Voice Cast: Akira Ishida as Goro Kusaka; Ben Hiura as Youhei Hayami; Daisuke Sakaguchi as Senta Umino; Hideo Ishikawa as Ichiro Suzuki; Hiroshi Yanaka as Hayato Nango; Kensho Ono as Kenji Minahaya; Unshō Ishizuka as Admiral Red

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Adapted from a manga first started in 1963, and adapted once already for a 1997 one-shot OVA, Submarine 707R is another title from the transition of Manga Entertainment into the early 2000s, where there would still be OVAs over the decade but eventually television shows alongside theatrical features would dominate their catalogue. Released by Geneon USA in the United States, that company (an off-shot of NBCUniversal Entertainment Japan) would fold in 2007, with the added fascination that this is also an Aniplex title. Aniplex are more known in the States, and are more controversial from the 2010s onwards for distributing their titles for physical media under prices closer to the Japanese market, which means very expensive and limited print runs, managing (unlike Bandai Visual in the 2000s) to actually succeed. This is almost quaint to look back on, with this two part OVA, before they were ever that company and merely one of the producers of such titles as Submarine 707R, perverse to consider.

Submarine 707R is what is says on the tin, about submarines, all that entails with eluding attacks from other submarines and ships above water, all with the danger that if the lead vessel is destroyed, the crew cannot escape the bottom of the ocean. The one touch which you may not gather even if you read the synopsis is that this is effectively set in an unknown future, a war between the world above the ocean on land, united despite frictions, and the USR (the Undersea Silence Revolution), an underwater civilisation where members like Admirable Red in his submarine attack boats and ships above to stop the surface civilisation exploiting the ocean. A lot of anime has had villains fighting, even wishing to destroy humanity, to protect the Earth's ecosystem, always a fascinating conundrum. That we see Red's family - his wife, three daughters and one infant son - shows an alternative to someone who can be seen as a cartoonish figure here otherwise, and enticing lead in for moral complexity.

Contrasting him is Captain Yōhei Hayami, captain of the 707, originally an older diesel ship not held in high regard until, whilst being taken to a conference for all nations, appears when everyone is being attacked with ease by Red, Hayami sacrificing his vessel to protect others after most were decimated beforehand. With the first episode dealing with a lot of the narrative prologue, the 707 is resurrected as a new ship immediately afterwards. As a straightforward plot progression, that Hayami is to clash with Captain Red once again, this adds a nice touch as he contrasts as a portly man who yet, alongside a talented crew, has an incredible mind for tactics.

Here I must confess that I accidentally put on the second episode on first, before stopping a quarter of its length in and watching Episode 1. As an accident, this emphasised the disappointments with the OVAs greatly. Watching Episode 2 blind, before realising the mistake, I have a more enticing work in front of me of a science fiction world, set in media res revealed to actually by the underwater civilisation of the USR, with a dominant number of female characters, including three older women commanding battleships for the surface. The show suggests an atmospheric and distinct nautical story, barring one odd creative choice, especially in a work you could show to kids, of a female staff member having a pronounced bounce in her bust moving in her seat in a scene, which is crass to point out if not so abruptly and deliberately animated by a potentially bored animator.

In reality, the OVA proves to be far less interesting than this, starting off with the true leads being a submarine ran entirely by men, including a trio of male teenagers, who never really stand out. The exception is Hayami himself, as a commander who does not use brawn but his mind, but even then you do not get much with him. Odder is that, whilst it is good we get to see his home life with his wife and daughter, there is an uncomfortable and pointless interest in his child daughter as a moe character, including an end credits for the first OVA, all in spite of not being a real character of note at all.  

In the first OVA, the pair effectively making up a feature length narrative, a lot of plot happens, including the destruction of the original 707, but the show never really hits a high gear. Considering the villain is effectively an eco-terrorist, or gets into the whole issue of the entire ocean becoming its own sovereignty, the anime does not really provide enough time to flesh this out. The first episode does tell a lot, all mentioned in the synopsis, but also a bit of jingoism. That, when all other nations boost of their new ships and squabble over who commands as they are all being obliterated, a little Japanese submarine that could wins. It is cheese, never good regardless of the country which does it, but thankfully less of a concern after that when it is about one ship, for all the surface nations, with a good captain against another submarine in a game of whit. It is perplexing though that, devoting the second episode entirely to that conflict, it manages to last over forty minutes and yet feels like nothing happened which is the ultimate flat note in spite of the promise.

The production also feels its age. Post the 2000s, this was created when digital animation took over. The notable thing for me is the clear use of digital models such as for the submarine, which would become common place into the decades after, but look noticeably separate from the normal animation in appearance with jarring effect. It is a work that, barring one scene in between its credit sequences, does not really stand out in imagination. That one scene, when I accidentally watched the first quarter of Episode 2, is Captain Red's wife on a giant industrial elevator with orchestral music playing, leading to her with her children in a domed room as outside is seemingly in Arctic tundra, completely masked in white snow. Even if the digital models for the elevator look aged, it all had an appropriate atmosphere which you do not find elsewhere. Everything else is pretty basic, and the irony is that the one really elaborate aspect of the production aesthetically, the best of the entire OVA, is the opening credits. Set to calm jazz, we see blueprints of the titular submarine being built and animation that is designed to look like sketch works as the submarine is created. That opening was directed by Hideaki Anno, of Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995), with Submarine 707R being directed by Shoichi Masuo, who worked on that series and Anno's own Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water (1990-1) series, as a Episode Director, so it makes sense for Anno to be involved.

But it says a lot that the opening credits are the one thing I pick out but cannot elaborate further from. Submarine 707R is a case of an anime which, with all the potential there, is just average. Simple as that, and it is not worth elaborating on.

Bonus #13: Gonad the Barbarian & Search for Uranus (1986)

 

"Director": Arthur King

"Screenplay": Arthur King

Viewed in English Dub

 

What's an agent of A.S.S. doing on my toilet?

We would have to face the situation eventually - that of reviewing uncensored hentai (porn) anime - but to just add an odd layer to the proceedings, let us begin with a very curious release. This will require a couple of contexts first. 1) When OVAs started as a format in 1983-4, straight to video anime alongside the videotape industry in general, naturally erotic anime would appear. 2) Called ero anime in Japan, "hentai" is the term we coined for the genre in the West despite being the Japanese term for "pervert". 3) As I have seen with the censored titles they tried to sell in the British Isles, it is a a prolific genre but also one that you could barely see in the United Kingdom, simply because of the type of content that would be allowed to be passed even in the modern day, but also because we still have a lot of restrictions of where you can purchase pornography still; the internet has become freed a lot of restrictions, deliberately or people going against our country's rules, but continually with laws trying to be passed in our country in regards of this, the internet as a medium for erotica of all types is one of debate still.

In terms of anime itself, one of the most iconic hentai series, not connected to today's subjects, is the Cream Lemon series, which in its original run started in 1984. That series helped, over its many sequel series, had great animators cutting their teeth, and even help lead to the term "lemon" be used for erotic fan fiction in the West. But naturally, there would be other titles, and other brands, and these are such titles. And in a curious decision, predating when Akira (1988) really began anime's relationship in the West, we ended up with members of the adult film industry licensing hentai and redubbing it with porn actors.

Gonad the Barbarian was the title, though only under thirty minutes to my surprise, I was intrigued to see, appropriated by Arthur King, a writer on titles like Ten Little Maidens (1985) with Harry Reems and Ginger Lynn. Hence, this cannot count as a regular review, as the American script and dub is its own creation which drastically changed the material, taking liberties to an extreme. In a sci-fi future, the villainous group G.A.S., led by the "slimy twit" Gonad the Barbarian, looking more like a bald moustached man with half an android's visor on, is behind the nefarious kidnapping of women. "So begins this tale of erotic valour and evil decadence", and yes, the narrator is the MVP just for the quotes. G.A.S have kidnapped Pussy La'Mour, forcing the people behind A.S.S., with members like Dr. Jerkoff, to ask Princess Layme to come back into their fold to help. Alongside its name changes (her friend and possible lover Dick for example), and some really peculiar touches like this Earth having submarine races at the beach, the due is also "special". Actually, the animation already is not great either. It is definitely a Japanese production, as there is kanji visible in scenes, but it however looks like a poorly animated children's show if you added in porn, with the added touch that the English dub is ridiculous.

This show presents a curious meeting of cultures as a result, very American porn attitudes with Japanese niche content. For starts, it is amazing to think, considering how most Japanese media is still expensive to buy even decades later in that country, that you would have to pay so much just to have a thirty minute animation like this, not well made and only having a few scenes, really more of a sci-fi show that a promised cavalcade of erotica even if from the early days of the medium. Princess Layme is also clearly a schoolgirl, which is definitely uncomfortable, the actress voicing her clearly sounding like a star from an eighties porn film, but definitely someone befittign the role; Pussy La'Mour's actress in contrast definitely sounds older than her character design. Some of the content in terms of plot does translate - I can see a Star Wars parody having a Dildo Sword, the Weapon Research Department, in a legitimately funny joke for this version, creating it either as perverts or that they outsourced their work to a sex toy designer.

To be honest, whilst I would be morbidly curious to see this with the original Japanese language track, this is probably superior in this form. Since we are talking about actually sex being depicted too, the one thing you have in hentai as a genre as its main point, it is crudely depicted. This is the equivalent of shrugging my shoulders as, regardless of its plot, or it being definitely of the eighties due to the Casio keyboard track or the heroine wearing a red headband, this is still aesthetically unpleasing regardless of your sexuality. This is something to bear in mind as, alongside problematic content, hentai anime's other big issue is the lack of quality animation. It neither helps that, to be blunt, the sex here is non-consensual and thus the title is also problematic too. This will be a worse issue with Search for Uranus, but for all the comedic porn noises and characters named "Anus Andy", this from its shots of bound and captured women is deeply problematic even if terribly drawn, entirely built around the female characters being put through erotic Stockholm Syndrome by sexual torture.

It would not pass still in the United Kingdom, where especially from the 2010s on, our film classificators have still a concern with sexual violent and non-consensual material even in fictional form, even rating regular films higher than in years pass if suggested or depicted. Thankfully as well, whilst also gross, they never have Gonad's friend Scotty involved; Scotty also happens to be a dog, if you were curious, and it is ugly that they tease that as a kink, even if it just means menacing, crude close ups to the dog and nothing else. The only real consolation prize in the original visual content, uncomfortable if merely absurd, is that, having designed the pervy equipment fostered on Princess Layme (even a device to track her using her underwear), Dr. Jerkoff is forced into being the first one to wear her skimpy work costume, giving us middle aged hairy legs as a result. As a result, whilst tacky and the adult actors not really voice performers, the work done by Arthur King, who is credited with producer/director/writer, probably saved Gonad the Barbarian from its poor quality and the discomfort around its content. Due to its humour and the participants turning it into a farce, it can be entertaining in the right context. It milks moments in the anime - those damn spaceship technicians handling the Dildo Sword and leaving it on the runway floor than putting it back in the ship - but adds so much silliness to soften the blow.

 

*****

Sadly that cannot be said for Search for Uranus, which in spite of its title is not actually science fiction, but a curious slice of ancient Greek iconography, including a lesbian Medusa, another trope that emphasises its era of origin in psychic powers, which were a craze for plots at the time, and a poor man's Urotsukidôji: Legend of the Overfiend (1989). With no context for this, not even realising Gonad the Barbarian was only under thirty minutes and Search for Uranus was not a subtitle, I thought I was in for more absurdity. Staring Princess Orgasma and Mark Starkiller, the narrator again won me over with lines like "we are specs of copulating dust..." or "...a fading rectal breeze", before leaving never to be heard again. If this had just been a Greek myth tinged tale of Espers (psychics) with added porn, it might have been compelling especially as the animation is a little better. The music, bouncy, vastly contrasts the actual material badly, and alongside mispronouncing "Medusa", in a female-female scene with music strangely reminiscent to a Sega Saturn game, there is something truly peculiar to porn actors trying to have elaborating anime exposition. But, the first scene involves a villain named Lord Uranus, a monstrosity who has more bound women around him and has tentacles. I had considered not writing about this anime, wishing to ignore it, as much due to whether anyone I knew or of importance would read this, thinking ill of me as a result when I could have just turned it off, but I decided to  still this part of the review.

All because I am a believer in freedom of art and speech, and whilst I would not say I was traumatised, it is probably better for me to write how, by pure accident, I witnessed my first uncensored scenes of tentacles in an anime and how uncomfortable it was even as crude doodles. Not because of the tentacles, which if a kink for someone, they have the right to have. Obviously, it is the non-consensual nature that is the issue, and this title would again not be allowed to be released in the United Kingdom unless butchered to barely a few minutes. Its cheese helps soften the blow, alongside the padding out of scenes by the end, but I cannot help but think of the apparent target audience for this title. Both because the porn scenes again feel crow barred in, and why this would have appear in the first place. It makes Call Me Tonight (1986) actually more poignant then I gave it credit for, another obscure OVA of only thirty or so minutes which parodied this material in the era, about a man who turned into a tentacle monster when he was aroused, making it more relevant and meaningful now with context of the material it was criticising.

And honestly, whilst I am even more wary about ever watching the uncut version of Urotsukidôji now as a result, that feels for more morally sound in comparison as the notion of transgressive and taboo subject matter similar to this was less the issue, even if it will be deemed offensive for most viewers, because it had an elaborate Lovecraftian horror narrative which was compelling even if grotesque. The gender discrepancy was always the issue with Urotsukidôji, where the women were always the victims of sexual violence, which understandably led to people calling it misogynistic. Something like Searching for Uranus in comparison however cannot be defended at all, because this is for someone's titillation let alone scraping the bottom of the barrel only. The Arthur King dialogue cannot hide this. It ends the review on a sour note, though we have the fascinating detail that this was not the last time Arthur King got the rights to anime erotica however: he was also involved with the titles Offenders of the Universe & Star Trap (1987), and Pandora... An Erotic Trilogy: The Dark Forest, the Black Widow and Living Shadows (1988), the later consisting of three titles together the most intriguing, though hopefully he chose wiser than this.

#159: Sekkō Boys (2016)

 

Director: Seiki Takuno

Screenplay: Michiko Yokote

Voice Cast: Shiho Kokido as Miki Ishimoto; Yui Makino as Mira Hanayashiki; Tomokazu Sugita as Saint Giorgio (聖ジョルジョ, Sei Jorujo); Shinnosuke Tachibana as Medici (メディチ, Medichi); Jun Fukuyama as Hermes (ヘルメス, Herumesu); Daisuke Ono as Mars (マルス, Marusu); Takaya Kuroda  as Hanzō Horibe (堀部 半蔵, Horibe Hanzō); Rena Maeda  as Kinue Yamashita (山下 絹枝, Yamashita Kinue); Takahiro Sakurai  as Hironori Yanagisawa (柳沢 宏典, Yanagisawa Hironori)

Viewed in Japanese with English Subtitles

 

Another micro series, and like many of them, this is slight but there is a pleasure in experiencing them, to watch (no matter how long it takes to view all the episodes) and experience their jokes and moments of playfulness. Especially when, at seven minutes per twelve episodes, Sekkō Boys is running with a strange premise it milks a lot of great content from to a virtue.

Namely the tale of a young female art student Miki Ishimoto, disillusioned with her previous aspirations due to being sick of drawing sculptures, getting the chance in a lifetime to manage an up-and-coming male boy band. Aside from the fact, however, the titular Sekkō Boys are four living statues, and not just plaster busts of anyone. They are of actual stone, as Miki got the job partially because the other staff have back injuries due to carrying them around, and are personifications of actual historical and mythological figures. Mars, the Roman God of War; Hermes, a Greek God; Saint George, as Saint Giorgio here, a real life figure accepted as a saint in Christianity and Islam famous for fighting a dragon in lore, and is the older leader of the group; and (Giuliano di Lorenzo de') Medici, an Italian nobleman and ruler of Florence, who is the youngest and the heartthrob.

Half the humour and why Sekkō Boys worked is that the humour, and the various strains of it, all play off enticing ideas such as these being living figures or mythological deities who just happen to be statues. Sometimes their limitations are enforced, as baring Hermes with his spare body they do not even have anything under the top of the shoulders, the reason why most of Miki's work is as much to carry them about or drive them. Other times a lack of logic is part of the joke. Sometimes there is, like one of the members being posted as a delivery to travel around secretly, but they can apparently drink and even beat each other up off-screen among other scenes witnesses. The lines are blurred whether they are viewed as just statues, and thus dismissed, but also celebrities. One gets a cameo in a popular crime show as a murder weapon, and that is not even the best part of the joke.

And the show plays to their cultural histories, exemplified by the fact they idolise a two men group who are also stone busts, not obvious figures either but Roman general Marcus Junius Brutus, and French playwright and poet Molière. Likewise, here the Gods will be the most recognisable figures but the jokes play with probably more knowledge of who they all are then even I picked up. Yes, there is a scene of Athena, calling to let one of the members know how embarrassed they and Zeus are when he looks terrible on a TV show interview. Yes, Hermes, considering he was a trickster God, is discovered heading a sneaky snake oil scheme. And, as a stoic saintly warrior of yore, Giorgio is the stick in the mud in the group with a habit of terrible Dad level puns, proof that the concept is a universal one that exists in both British and Japanese culture even if puns are a fine art, especially in anime scripts, for the bad ones as much as the funniest. He does however manage to trend online and in general in popularity for "Giorgio-ing" which helps the saint's confidence immensely.

Most of the show is episodic, as with most of these micro series, but like the best, even if the shows are slight their characters are memorable, which is clearly their goal in that, if they stick, these figures in any scenario if there were more than one season would be fun to imagine in. Even side characters are memorable here in the little we get, like a female idol singer Mira Hanayashiki who is significantly more popular than the Sekkō Boys but both likes them, developing friendships with the band, and also (in her costume inspired by a moth) really likes insects, leading to a scandal when one of the boys is caught at her apartment even if she is just showing him her favourite live beetle. That this is still a show about a male idol group trying to success is inherently interesting as, if any of it is accurate to the truth, it could have been made into a great drama show just from all the stress and anxiety.  

Even in this absurd comedic form, many of the jokes are not the band as statues but the strain of trying to succeed. Having to dodge around interviews, making sure they are not destroyed by an interviewer notorious for her ability to crush interviewees with her questions, or getting enough time to perform on a big TV variety show because another group, a whole squadron of golden Buddhist statues, has to have introductions for them all. Even a very dark joke which could be seen as problematic, that of one of the Sekkō Boys having to sleep with someone to help to band, has the added absurdity to soften the touch of, well, being a stone bust without even arms.

Honestly, the only real disappointment with this show is that it had to end - after only twelve episodes, the joke could have been taken further or a better ending was found. Especially for a micro series, the final episode is of importance for me, and this one, of Medici vanishing, does not really stand out. More so as the dynamic and emotional turn, of Miki quitting her job, was played out an episode or so before and a more appropriate ending.

The one detail worth covering, enough to create a more elaborate review, was that I stumbled across Sekkō Boys due to its mention on a list online for the weirdest anime. Sekkō Boys to an outsider would be bizarre, and the premise is, but it is a noted detail of anime that many strange premises have passed my eyes, and for anime fans able to watch even more than I have, but do not cause us to bat our eyelids. Especially with comedy, unless they are very strange, humour softens the premise when you know it is not meant to be taken seriously, and the tone here is more conventional than something truly weird would be. What instead stands out instead is that, whilst not the most distinct micro series I have encountered, it does enforce how this type of show really develops talent. For once, rather than a group of actresses, this show is about a quad of male voice actors being allowed to show their talent, especially with the added difficulty that they are voicing statues who never emote or animated, petrified stone statues with one facial expression throughout. In itself, this is the real virtue to take away from Sekkō Boys alongside how, with a nice and pleasing aesthetic with a distinct strange touch, the show won me over.