“Believe in ㋐ from the bottom of your heart.”

From the placards behind Sara Azuma in her “Good morning!” greeting

This is a continuation of notes on Sara Azuma’s scrolling text reports, lucky selfie items, and what they could be telling us about Sarazanmai‘s thematic elements and plot events.

Special thanks to Good Haro for full translations of the text crawls here. I highly suggest following her on Twitter as well for more Sarazanmai translated content and speculation.

Sara’s messages in Episodes 1-2 can be found here.

Sara’s messages in Episodes 3-4 can be found here.

Mild spoilers for the Sarazanmai companion manga, Reo and Mabu ~ Together They’re Sarazanmai.

Episode 5: “I Want to Connect, but I Can’t Be Forgiven”

Lucky selfie item: sachet

While waiting in line to meet Sara Azuma in person, Haruka Yasaka asks his mother what a sachet is. She responds that it’s a pouch that gives off a nice scent and Haruka’s eyes widen. Unbeknownst to his mother or older brother Kazuki Yasaka, Haruka has a special sachet in his possession: the sachet of Kazuki’s biological mother.

Much of this episode deals in the guilt that Kazuki feels because he cannot forgive himself for Haruka’s accident, but it also deals in his isolation and separation, which stems from an off-handed mean-spirited comment from his late grandfather revealing that Kazuki is not the Yasaka’s son.

The visuals of the episode reiterated the separation that exists in Kazuki’s mind. Shots like the one above show how the Yasaka family likes to wear matching outfits, but Kazuki is on the outside looking in (wearing a fake Sara Azuma costume no less).

Here, the lucky selfie item helps establish two familial groups within Kazuki’s life each tied to a sense (sight or smell).

He’s tied to the Yasakas visually, but eschews wearing the matching outfits once he realizes that he’s not their biological son. Even then, he actively chooses the Yasaka family (even if he doesn’t have a chance to express this to Haruka before Haruka’s accident). Then there’s the lucky selfie item of the sachet, which deals in the powerful sense of scent or smell. This ties him to his biological mother, who he’s happy to meet for a sense of closure, but walks away from to be with the Yasakas. Discovering that Haruka has his mother’s sachet as it floats away in the hands of an unseen kappa zombie is too much for Kazuki to handle when filtered through his own self-loathing and guilt.

As for Sara’s text crawls, there’s a particular line that stands out in her odd scrolling text this week: “There are only two kinds of people in this world: those who have a knack for it, and those who don’t, dish.” (For context, I’m going to stress that you read Good Haro’s notes on the translation of this line specifically.)

The line separates, like many things in Kunihiko Ikuhara series, those who can and those who can’t (those who are chosen and those who are not, etc.). With Kazuki unable to make connections and torn away from his family by his own self-hatred and guilt, this line hits particularly hard. One interpretation could be that Sara is commenting on the fact that Kazuki hasn’t been chosen, but as we discover in the next episode (and knew all along, really) that’s not actually true at all, outside of Kazuki’s own mental filters.

Episode 6: “I Want to Connect, So I’m Not Giving Up”

Lucky selfie item: sachet

After Sara’s lucky selfie item is announced as a sachet again, to her confusion, we see Sara’s news report repeating the incident from the previous day as well. With the boys stuck as kappa and Kazuki in complete denial, everything is at a standstill. Sara’s text crawls change, but piggyback on themes from the previous week regarding Kazuki’s feelings of isolation and which senses are tied to which family.

“Don’t smells bother you? Sara takes two baths dish a single day. One dish before sleeping and one dish after waking up. A lot of sebum is excreted while sleeping.”

The first line of “Don’t smells bother you?” while seemingly innocuous, is loaded considering the context of Kazuki’s dilemma and the sachet as a lucky selfie item. Scent and sachets for Kazuki mean his biological mother. Kazuki can’t wash that scent away, or her memory, in a bath. It bothers him. Just like the kappa zombie of both weeks, which is trying to get a specific scent out of a salamander that reminds him of a woman he’s infatuated with, Kazuki can’t physically return to the memory of his mother, nor should he let himself wallow in that memory or her scent.

During Sara’s news announcement we also see a visual preview of Reo Niiboshi’s ningyoyaki that he’s later seen eating while talking to Haruka before taking Haruka in. Ningyoyaki is a twist on taiyaki that’s specific to Asakusa, and one of the foods that Mabu made for Reo during the timespan of their companion manga.

Like Kazuki, Reo is stuck. Sara’s text crawls and news announcements tie the two together visually, hinting that Reo is doing something similar for Mabu (who is now like a doll/ningyo) that Kazuki was doing for Haruka during his Sara Azuma crossdressing days. However, at the end of this episode, Kazuki realizes important truths about his relationship with Haruka and seems to be ready to move forward. Meanwhile, Reo (and Mabu) remain frozen.

Not too long ago, I read a Final Fantasy XV fanfiction one-shot of Noctis Lucis Caelum and Ignis Scientia. You don’t have to necessarily know who these characters are specifically for this meandering exercise, but know that they have been inseparable from a very young age (think six years-old or so) through their early twenties due to circumstances of their upbringing. These are two people who should know each other very well, if not intimately, having spent the majority of their lives together. At the very least, there is no one that they know better than the other. The story’s premise was that confusion — or some other status effect brought on by a fight gone horribly wrong — caused Ignis to not recognize that Noctis is, well, Noctis.

Instead, Ignis believes that Noctis is an imposter. In Noctis’ efforts to escort Ignis back to the rest of their group hilarity, as they say, ensues while Ignis is convinced the fake-but-actually-real Noctis is leading him into a trap. The story was charming, but also had an odd dark humor that I don’t know if the author intended. Some of Ignis’ genuine confusion could have been also read as heartbreaking. The story played with a lot of our deepest insecurities — primarily what happens if someone we love fails to recognize us for who we are. It actively hurts them both.

What makes others unrecognizable to us? What makes us unrecognizable to them? Is it a slow process over time or caused by a sudden catalyst? Is it due to societal pressures or natural personality shifts?

Can we return to a time where we felt like they recognized us?

Spoilers for the Sarazanmai companion manga, Reo and Mabu ~ Together They’re Sarazanmai.

Reo and Mabu were first introduced to the potential Sarazanmai audience via an aptly-titled Twitter account @keeponly1luv and a companion one-volume manga release called Reo and Mabu ~ Together They Are Sarazanmai. The manga features Reo and Mabu co-parenting a baby Sara Azuma and the Twitter account features their daily lives together with each post tagged as either #Reo or #Mabu to denote the poster. Many of the subjects in these posts have been featured, indirectly like an offhanded mention of a cat or directly like the broccoli on soba pictured above.

In addition to establishing a rather fluffy domestic partnership between Reo and Mabu as they raise Sara, it also sets the tone for what Reo and Mabu’s relationship dynamic was at one point in time. Manga Mabu is much more expressive than his Sarazanmai anime counterpart. He is passionate about cooking and fairly possessive of Reo. The opening chapter of the manga features Mabu obsessively cooking pancakes for Reo, trying to recapture a specific flavor, while also making it abundantly clear that he made them for Reo and Reo alone when another young man tries to eat them.

This all seems rather silly (it is) but it’s an immediate shortcut to Mabu’s personality: expressive, passionate, and someone who shows his love by creating food. This a direct contrast to Mabu’s cold, emotionless demeanor in the anime. If we’re taking Mabu’s manga personality as a snapshot of “before” it makes sense that this Mabu would actively step in front of a deathblow headed for Reo, taking the hit instead, even if it cost him his life (or personality).

Which one is the “real” Mabu? Would Reo even be able to tell?

The opening scene of Sarazanmai‘s seventh episode features an emotionless Mabu admirably trying to choke down food. In previous episodes, Reo has eaten alone, but here we see that there is already a plate of food in front of Mabu and Reo automatically made broccoli portions for both of them, not just himself. Food is an important part of Reo and Mabu’s relationship. Cooking is how Mabu previously showed his love for Reo. Now presumably unable to cook (or eat) these become active, hurtful reminders to Reo of who Mabu used to be. Reo cannot recognize the Mabu of his mind and in his heart in the Mabu that sits in front of him every day at the police station. Even then, he gathers desires to feed Mabu’s mechanical heart, keeping him alive.

Even then, he makes a double portion of broccoli.

When Reo is first confronted with post-accident Mabu, he immediately rejects Mabu, saying that Mabu would never look at him “like that” — presumably emotionless when compared to Mabu’s prior passion. Reo also channels a bit of Kazuki Yasaka, accepting guilt for Mabu’s death in a similar way that Kazuki felt solely responsible for Haruka Yasaka’s accident.

Returning to the opening food scene, which becomes a microcosm for the entirety of their relationship, we see two people who are completely unable to communicate with each other. Mabu says that he still has someone he cares about. Reo doesn’t realize, or is willfully ignoring the fact, that is Reo himself and not some unnamed figure in the Otter Empire. Reo doesn’t see that Mabu, despite changing, is directly in front of him.

Although expressed as an odd magical attack from a dark Keppi-like figure, the Otter Empire is likely a representation of societal pressures or simply the passing of time. Mabu is not the same person he was in the past. Reo doesn’t recognize that. Like Enta Jinai, the other focal point of Episode 7, Reo obsessively wants to return to the way things were, rather than recognizing the situation and Mabu for who he is now.

“Damn it! Why do you keep worrying about Kuji!”

-Enta Jinai to Kazuki Yasaka, Sarazanmai, Episode 7

Enta Jinai is a disaster, both relatable and familiar.

Following Sarazanmai‘s second episode — where the depths of Kazuki Yasaka’s obsession and dedication to his convoluted relationship with his brother Haruka Yasaka begin to be revealed — I wondered what Enta’s breaking point would be. Although we had yet to learn the extent of Toi Kuji and Kazuki’s failed connections with Chikai Kuji and Haruka respectively, it was obvious that those two would do anything to maintain their faulty, misguided relationships. Anything, in their cases, included but was not limited to running the family drug business, crossdressing, and later in the series, kidnapping.

Throughout the first few episodes, Enta maintains a (false) sense of purity about Kazuki and Toi’s actions, passing judgment on both of them, especially Toi. Even Kazuki, whom he forgives and enables almost instantly, isn’t exempt from Enta saying that his stealing a cat “isn’t right.” There’s a reason why Kazuki immediately goes to Toi when plotting to kidnap Sara Azuma and not Enta — the fact that Enta has already been tasked with escorting Haruka to Sara’s fanmeet aside.

Enta isn’t the one you call to commit crimes, but despite his righteous act, he desperately wants to be.

Instead, Enta tries to be the voice of reason. Only this fails because he can’t seem to stop himself from enabling Kazuki. His obsession, and breaking point, is Kazuki, who Enta kisses without consent as early as the end of the second episode. By the end of the seventh, Enta is pretending to be a happy friendship trio with Kazuki and Toi, while stealing the dishes of hope against Kazuki’s wishes, trashing their soccer practice space secretly, and letting his jealousy of Kazuki and Toi’s burgeoning friendship eat him alive.

This makes Enta worse, in a way, than both Kazuki and Toi. Enta is the person who pretends to be good, passes judgment on others for straying, while committing equal or worse acts himself.

Saying that someone “can’t help themselves,” is a loaded phrase. Like the title of Enta’s first lead vocal performance — which passes off his inability to connect due to something else rather than Enta’s own actions — it implies that another force is at work acting on Enta and making his actions somewhat out of his control. His inability to connect with Kazuki in the way that he wants to is born of his own obsession, but also outside forces. Kazuki could be straight. Kazuki could be gay but just not want Enta in that way. Because of this, Enta is driven to control what he can to an obsessive degree, helped along by his jealousy of Kazuki and Toi’s relationship. He sets up scenarios so that they can play out like his daydreams, and falls apart even more when his plans don’t come to fruition.

Like those who came before Enta in Kunihiko Ikuhara series past — Kyouichi Saionji, Touga Kiryuu, and Nanami Kiryuu (Revolutionary Girl Utena), Keiju Tabuki and Yuri Tokikago (Mawaru Penguindrum), Yuriika Hakonaka (whose family name literally means “in a box,” Yuri Kuma Arashi) and many others from these seres to varying degrees — Enta is both victim and perpetrator of the system.

And in an Ikuhara series, the villain is always the system.

This doesn’t make Enta’s possessive, jealous actions right — just as being victims of the system hardly excuses the actions of Saionji et. al. It also doesn’t mean that Enta’s feelings for Kazuki don’t have a layer of honesty. His confession to Kazuki is genuinely heartbreaking, and will resonate with anyone who has ever been queer and had what they felt was an unnatural or awkward crush on a friend.

It’s also no coincidence that Enta’s second lead episode is where Sarazanmai reveals more about Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu’s relationship. Like Reo, Enta cannot recognize that the person he wants to be with has changed. Part of Enta’s love of Kazuki is rooted in a desperate desire to return to the past, and we see both Reo and Mabu struggle with this concurrently. The title of Enta’s first lead episode, “I want to connect, but it’s not meant to be” has now become a self-fulfilling prophecy. The more Enta refuses to recognize the Kazuki in front of him, the more he will push Kazuki away but this is the only way he knows (or has been taught) how to connect with Kazuki now that Kazuki has changed. While Reo and Mabu seem too deeply mired in the system to make an escape, there is hope for Enta, just as there was hope for Kazuki, and it likely lies beyond what he currently knows.

Sarazanmai‘s eighth episode breaks the pattern of episodes prior. There is no “Kawausoiya” and no trio singing on the otherworldly version of Azumabashi trying to capture a kappa zombie’s shirikodama.

Yet, Azumabashi bridge — the location of Sarazanmai‘s field of desires — still plays a large and similar role in this episode. It connects people.

Azumabashi (“Azuma Bridge”) was the last of five bridges spanning the Sumida River (at that time called Ookawa or “Big River”) built during the Tokugawa Shogunate. It connects, in the words of Sara Azuma herself, Sumida Ward and Taito Ward. It’s also been called “East Bridge” or “Wife Bridge” even after the kanji for higashi (east) and azuma (which can also mean east) were separated. Azuma can also mean “my wife” and has ties to a nearby shrine, Azuma Shrine. This was said to be the shrine of Yamato Takeru’s wife, Princess Ototachibana, who threw herself into the ocean to appease the gods and grant Takeru safe passage. Through multiple renovations and more than a few natural disasters, Azumabashi has become one of the iconic bridges of Tokyo. The wayward pylons in the river pictured above are likely from prior iterations of the bridge.

Sarazanmai questions the strength of connections — especially in a world of social media, commodification, etc. — and how well we’re aware of the connections we make with others. To steal a line from a favorite Kunihiko Ikuhara reference point, The Little Prince, it’s our awareness of the responsibility for that which we have tamed. Most of these connections all lead to one physical place in the series: Azumabashi.

When we’re first introduced to Kazuki Yasaka, even in Sarazanmai preview videos, he was running along the Sumida River with Azumabashi in his sight. As we hear Haruka Yasaka yell, “Kazu-chan!” immediately before his accident, the reflection of Azumabashi is shown in the water.

Azumabashi is not-so-coincidentally the location of the mystical Field of Desires, where the main trio of Kazuki, Toi Kuji, and Enta Jinai fight kappa zombies and steal their shirikodama. It’s also the location that the aforementioned Sara names as her home — despite being brought up as a baby by Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu in the prequel manga — and takes her family name “Azuma” from. (As an aside, it’s interesting that “Azuma” could also designate Sara as “my wife” related to Keppi the kappa prince).

Above all else, in Sarazanmai, Azumabashi connects things (a bridge’s purpose). It physically spans the river, connecting parts of Tokyo. It connects the kappa trio with the kappa zombies’ desires, and subsequently the kappa trio with their own secret desires. It’s the location of their makeshift soccer practice area.

And, following Episode Eight, it’s both an initial meeting place and a departure point for Toi and Kazuki.

When given space to breathe a bit, Ikuhara excels at setting up patterns — like the Kawausoiya and Sarazanmai songs/transformation sequences every episode — and then breaking them. Similarly, he enjoys returning to specific places or scenes and adding greater context by mixing up character groupings in that episode and returning to known physical locations. In this episode, that means pairing up Enta and Toi’s older brother Chikai for an episode, returning to the soccer practice area at Azumabashi via flashback, and returning to the Hanayashiki amusement park.

Unlike Toi and Kazuki, who were forced into close physical contact at Hanayashiki in the second episode, Enta and Chikai are purposefully separated visually. This is particularly poignant when the viewer realizes that Toi knew who Kazuki was all along, even while being dragged through the amusement park, forced to hold Kazuki’s hand the entire time.

Kazuki doesn’t remember, but it was Toi who gave him the miçanga he wears all the time — later erroneously “borrowed” by Enta to become Enta’s desire box item because he thinks it connects him and Kazuki — and first did the “Saratto!” pose. In his effort to give up the thing he loves, soccer, for his brother, a young Toi throws a soccer ball off of Azumabashi and happens to meet Kazuki. Kazuki remembers none of this.

“People realize they were connected when they no longer are.”

-Toi Kuji to Kazuki Yasaka, Sarazanmai, Episode 8

Toi says this to Kazuki twice: once when they were children, and again as he’s leaving with Azumabashi in front of them, likely in a desperate attempt to jog Kazuki’s memory.

It doesn’t work.

These words along with Azumabashi frame Toi’s departure, Kazuki’s fight with Enta, and Enta’s (possibly fatal) injury, making them all the more tragic. Toi realizes he was connected to Kazuki, but feels as if he no longer is due to Kazuki’s lack of recognition. Enta realizes Kazuki and Toi were connected before he and Kazuki were connected, making the previously strong “claim” to Kazuki over Toi that he had built up in his mind, completely moot. And, as Enta is dying in his arms with Toi already gone, Kazuki realizes he was connected to both of them, but may never see either again.

“To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world….”

-The fox to the little prince, The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

I return to The Little Prince a lot as a literary reference or frame through which to view other media. Its lessons are so simple and plainly said, yet remarkably difficult to achieve in life. Similarly, Kunihiko Ikuhara (who is also a fan of The Little Prince) uses seemingly-complex visual metaphors or specific visual and auditory languages to tell what are ultimately simple, but no less powerful, emotional narratives.

The shift between child to adult — and simple but important things adults may miss due to societal constraints or expectations — is the most-discussed lesson of The Little Prince, yet the one I was always interested in was that of connections. Or as the fox says to the little prince, “taming.”* What makes life bearable and meaningful is often found in relationships with others or connections, as Sarazanmai would say, and this is the most powerful force in existence, divine even.

The ninth episode of Sarazanmai bears the title “I Want to Connect, But I Can’t Express It” (or literally, I’m not transmitting it/it’s not transmitting). It’s fitting that it begins with one ㋐ symbol transmitting but the other not and/or refusing to receive said transmission. Sarazanmai has dealt in one-sided relationships from the beginning — where two or more people are unable to connect with each other due to each party having a set understanding of what they see that relationship as, and how they want it to go.

Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu are the most clear-cut example of this. In this episode, we see both of them attempt to return to their former selves to salvage their relationship, even if it’s under false pretenses. Mabu succeeds in making food that Reo approves of, and Reo immediately picks up food of his own and a bottle of wine for them to share and celebrate — all while dancing West Side Story choreography across Azumabashi and singing, “The perfect couple.” When he comes face to face, again, with the fact that Mabu is irrevocably changed — he’s still Mabu but he’s not the Mabu that Reo knows — he still refuses to accept this.

Furthermore, he refuses his own part in it, calls Mabu an imposter, and resumes his efforts to collect the Dishes of Hope to “return” Mabu. Mabu saying that he needs the desire part of Reo — represented by the shapeshifting otter — also speaks volumes. Since Reo has rejected him time and again, he’s seeking out that part of Reo that still wants him.

There are many parallels between Reo and Mabu’s relationship and the relationship Enta Jinai has with Kazuki Yasaka, especially when it comes to how Enta views Kazuki as a way to return to his sepia-tinged childhood past. The Kazuki that occupies Enta’s daydreams isn’t the Kazuki that exists in life, especially after Haruka Yasaka’s accident.

However, this doesn’t mean that Enta’s feelings aren’t based in something genuine and, for Enta himself, transcendent. When Enta was a lonely, isolated kid who had just moved back to Japan alone, Kazuki reached out to him based on a soccer connection. This experience helped shape and change Enta’s life for the better. It’s no wonder that he wouldn’t want to hold onto that as tightly as possible. Similarly, I would assume that Reo and Mabu’s relationship is based on a genuine and deep connection at its core. You are forever responsible for what you have tamed, and in this case, it means stripping away all other white noise to get to the core of that relationship or connection so both parties are transmitting and receiving. Kazuki already had to do this once with his brother Haruka to fully realize his connection to his own family — something that is lovingly referenced in this episode in Kazuki’s conversation with Haruka.

Then we have Chikai and Toi Kuji, who never manage to connect as equals despite both brothers performing extraordinary sacrifices for each other. They’re the cautionary tale of each sacrifice without actually talking to each other about what they want out of their relationship and for themselves.

This follows a similar pattern seen in other Ikuhara series where the true brushes with a god or any sort of divine, transcendent experience is actually a painfully human connection. It’s no coincidence that the two main “gods” in this series, Sara Azuma and Keppi, have been sidelined and are essentially useless. Yes, Keppi gives Enta some extended time for Kazuki to save his life, but what it’s likely to come down to will be the connection that Kazuki and Enta have, and even then it might be too late for Enta. After all, in a similar situation, Reo has presumably tried to keep “his” Mabu alive by doing awful things, and it’s brought him nothing but heartache.

*taming in this sense is from the French verb “apprivoiser” which is translated into English as “to tame” but has a softer meaning than complete (and unequal) dominion over a wild animal. It’s more like subduing a majestic or shy creature (like a fox, or a human for that matter). Apprivoiser was also used in the anime Star Driver alongside many other trappings from The Little Prince. 

There are people in my industry that give me hope for the future. I’ve told them as such. As it continues to grind forward into the future, they are the ones keeping others in check. They are brave, frequently eschewing or challenging existing systems or a general status quo. I’m fortunate to know them because, quite frankly, I’m a bit of a coward.

In an interview about Sarazanmai, director Kunihiko Ikuhara mentions the future, and specifically how it’s always marketed as something good. “The future is sparkling,” he paraphrases a commodified message. Everything in post-war Japan is “an improvement” and whatever lies in the future is certainly better than the past. You can see this in the upcoming preparations for the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo — which not-so-coincidentally are featured in the skyline frequently in Sarazanmai.

If there is hope for the future, it’s not in commodified messages or Ama-Kappa-zon boxes of desire. The challenge of Sarazanmai is the same one that my friends are rising to face in my industry: wading through oceans of societal bullshit and infrastructure while fighting it with genuine passion.

The future isn’t always sparkling, but even Sarazanmai — a series that argues heavily against looking towards the future with a blanket rosy outlook from the marketing machine — has hope. A better future is possible, it’s just not the one that’s been marketed or promised.

First, the story of Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu, the two who perpetuated the system.

It’s no coincidence that Reo and Mabu are policemen. Their career choice tasks them with uploading the law which, by the by, means maintaining the status quo and order. Nothing will advance under their jurisdiction, including their own relationship.

Formerly Keppi’s vassals, Reo and Mabu fall into the hands of the Otter Empire when the Kappa Kingdom falls. Mabu sacrifices himself for Reo, which sets off a chain of events that gives Mabu a mechanical heart and forces the two into a seemingly endless toxic cycle in service of the Otter Empire’s nefarious plans. The poisoning of their relationship is painful to watch, especially for viewers who read the purposefully fluffy and domestic manga about their partnership, Reo and Mabu, Together They Are Sarazanmai, prior to watching the series.

Reo, the more visible and outgoing of the pair, grumbles about gathering the desires of others and berates throughout the series Mabu for being an emotionless doll, but ultimately is unwilling to face Mabu’s death again. This is why he continues the cycle. For Mabu, he is told to give up his connection to Reo by renouncing their love. If he tells Reo that he loves him, Mabu’s heart will stop and he will die. He says that he hates Reo and perpetuates his own cycle. Their relationship and love for each other quickly becomes something poisonous and toxic once societal pressures infiltrate it and, as cops, they uphold this system all while it continues to exploit their relationship.

Mabu extricates both of them from this cycle by effectively committing suicide (as an aside, I don’t think Reo or Mabu are “officially” dead within the scope of the series, knowing Ikuhara). He tells Reo that he loves him and his artificial heart stops.

Reo goes on a minor rampage in his grief before breaking down and asking aloud, “Who was I pissed off at?” It’s a particularly heartbreaking moment, not only because he’s about to forget Mabu — similar to the kappa zombies he and Mabu created who were erased from memory once they were defeated by the trio — but because of who he’s actually pissed off at: himself. He didn’t recognize that Mabu was in front of him this entire time. He was swayed by the Otter Empire. And at the end of it all, he wasn’t even the one who was strong enough to profess his true love. Reo’s anguish also cements the villain as the system, not as Reo or Mabu (although they’re complicit in continuing it).

As for what in particular the Otter Empire refers to, there are no small amount of societal expectations that would keep a man from professing his love to another man. It’s a different situation than what Yuri Kuma Arashi was attempting to dismantle — this idea that romantic connections between queer women are allowed up to a certain point before they’ll inevitably “grow out of them” — because there are different, but equally toxic, societal rules in place for queer men, but Sarazanmai seems to have a similar goal in mind.

It’s also no coincidence that Reo and Mabu are older than the main trio of Kazuki Yasaka, Enta Jinai, and Toi Kuji (and, by extension, Haruka Yasaka, who is even younger and has an incredibly important role to play in all of this). The future lies with them, if they can not be swayed by the same societal quagmire that ultimately trapped Reo and Mabu.

Enta has been — rightfully and maliciously — maligned throughout the series for his actions. His crush on Kazuki is genuinely heartbreaking — it bears repeating that anyone who has had a crush on a member of the same sex but had no idea what to do about it will relate to Enta in some way, I definitely did and still do — but the manipulative nature of his actions deserves scrutiny. Enta appears to be the next person poised to continue the toxic cycle of the Otter Empire, especially when the otters tempt him with Kazuki in a similar way to how they tempted Mabu.

Yet Enta, despite his many flaws, has also witnessed Kazuki’s own transformation in the series. We know what his answer will be to the otters’ temptation based on his dying words in the eighth episode: “It’s no use. Even as a lie, I can’t say that I hate you.” Although we don’t know it upon first viewing, this is where Sarazanmai draws a line between Mabu and Enta, with Enta doing what Mabu could not. Like Mabu, Enta takes a direct hit/bullet for his loved one. Unlike Mabu, Enta cannot renounce his love of Kazuki, even in jest.

This foreshadows his actions in this episode. He not only breaks the dish, destroying the otters’ illusion and reiterating his love for Kazuki, Enta also stops Kazuki from sacrificing himself. When questioned, Enta still has hope for the future and tells Kazuki as such.

This is a repost of Notes on Hyouka as an Exploration of Detective Fiction as published on Altair & Vega on July 5, 2012. As the post’s original author, I have reposted it here for preservation purposes since that blog is no longer fully functioning. It has not been edited or revised in any way. 

Notes on the Characters as Stand-ins For Detective Fiction Archetypes:

Alluded to elsewhere, Hyouka first and foremost establishes its characters as detective fiction archetypes, rather than stand-alone characters. There are not-so-subtle hints in the first three episodes: one character’s catchphrase is, “I’m curious!” while another character flat-out states, “I am the database.” This comes to a wonderful reveal in the fourth episode when the four main characters set about solving their first mystery together. They meet, each presenting their theories. In turn, these theories encapsulate each of their roles, and which archetype, or piece of detective fiction, they represent within the series. Their individual reactions to the theories of their compatriots also further define their roles.

The first to present a theory is Eru Chitanda, who is pure, undiluted curiosity. Representing only the desire to learn what happened, her theory is very simple and easily disregarded by her counterparts. It’s also worth noting that hers is a very emotional theory, tied up in the fact that she represents the emotional investment, curiosity, of the detective. She presents the easiest outcome for herself to accept because she is emotionally invested; the mystery involves her uncle.

Next is Mayaka Ibara, who represents the audience viewpoint, or the ordinary counterpart to the extraordinary detective; Dr. John H Watson to Sherlock Holmes. Ibara is crucial because she’s intelligent, but not as intelligent as others: as a librarian she can gather information, but may not be able to piece it together. However, being the most ordinary of the group, she will also occasionally see things that the others, bound by their respective viewpoints, are unable to see. Ibara’s theory is limited by the amount of material she researches, and her own inability to correctly deduce what happened. Occasionally, she may have a breakthrough, as she is not unintelligent, but for the most part her theories, like the one she presents in Episode Four, will fall short.

Third to share their theory is Satoshi Fukube, the self-described database. What he offers is research and facts with little to no deduction or conclusion as to how they relate to each other. Fukube is far better at supporting or refuting others’ theories than presenting his own. This is due to the strengths and weaknesses of his position: excellent memory and a wealth of knowledge, with less of an ability to deduce an outcome than all of the other participants, respectively.

Lastly, there is Houtarou Oreki, the deductive reasoning component. Oreki is portrayed as the most exemplary of the four main cast members, and with good reason. In addition to being the primary lead, he also represents the key piece of what makes the detective: deduction. One is far more likely to come across a Chitanda, an Ibara, or a Fukube, than one is to happen upon a person with extraordinary deductive prowess like Houtarou.

That being said, Oreki too has an obvious blind spot: the information that he is provided with, along with his own ability to keep track of it. Deductive reasoning relies on given statements that are to be taken as valid. If the statements are invalid then, presumably, Oreki would rule them out through his thinking process. However, if he is presented with an untrue statement or, as the series presents in Episode 10, neglects to keep track of all of the facts, it renders his conclusions unsound. In addition to this, he doesn’t naturally consider the emotions of the participants involved without someone like Chitanda to remind him. In this way, Hyouka suggests that all pieces are necessary to solve a mystery.

Together, Chitanda, Fukube, and Oreki make up the necessary components of the detective, with Ibara as our personal stand-in to the proceedings.

Notes on Knox’s 10 Commandments and Hyouka:

Episode Eight of Hyouka introduces Ronald Knox’s 10 Commandments as a guideline for writing detective fiction. They are as follows:

-The culprit must be introduced early on in the narrative, but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader is privy to.

-All supernatural instances must be ruled out.

-No more than one secret room or passageway is allowed.

-No previously undiscovered poisons or scientific developments that would take a large amount of time to explain.

-No Chinamen.

-No accidents can aid in the solving of the story; neither can a sudden intuition.

-The detective themselves must not be the culprit.

-The detective must declare any/all clues that they discover.

-The sidekick of the detective must not conceal their thoughts. They also must be slightly below the intelligence of the average reader.

-No twins, unless the story has sufficiently made a case for their existence.

All of these are fairly self-explanatory (with the exception of five, which is an archaic and incredibly racist character archetype). These rules are introduced as guidelines for a fictional script within the series. However, if one chooses to apply them to the series, one discovers that the mysteries presented within also follow these rules.

Notes On Why We Love Mysteries:

In Episodes Nine through 11, the Hyouka team is called upon to complete an unfinished mystery movie script for another class’s cultural festival project. Mirroring Episode Four, three students from Class 2-F present their theories as to what the original scriptwriter, a meek girl named Hongou, would have wanted. Previously, Hyouka had addressed the key components of detective fiction. In these episodes, the series chooses to explore why an audience is drawn to such stories.

Leading off, Junya Nakajou presents his theory; the most bare-bones, direct, and simple solution of the group. Nakajou could care less about the details in the script, camera work, or acting. As he states above, he represents the mystery-reading population that loves it for the high tension and drama. In Nakajou’s ending, the most important thing would be a tearful confession scene as the culprit is cornered and forced to admit his crime. His actual resolution, a locked-room mystery where the culprit entered and exited through the window, is the least complex to think up. When questioned by Ibara, Nakajou presumes that Hongou was unable to write a more complicated trick. The truth in this statement is that Nakajou himself cannot think of a more complex resolution. He is only focusing on the drama and desiring the ending that will least tax his, and the audience’s, mind.

The props master, Tomohiro Haba, is the next to present, giving a more complex but concise answer than his brutish predecessor. From the moment he enters the room, Haba goes out of his way to establish himself as intellectually superior to Hongou, and the main Hyouka cast that he is presenting his theory to. As props master, Haba is privy to details that his classmates, like Nakajou, may not have known. He uses these, along with a fully-prepared floor map, as part of his presentation. Patronizing Hongou, he says that she could only manage reading the amateurish, entry-level mysteries of Sherlock Holmes. In spite of offering a more complex resolution than Nakajou, Haba makes it known that he believes that his version of what Hongou would have wanted is simplistic and easily solved. Haba represents the audience that wants to feel intellectually superior through reading mystery novels.

Misaki Sawaguchi, the publicity manager, is the last to offer a theory. Her personality is jubilant and bubbly, reflecting her role of spreading the word about the movie. Sawaguchi equates mystery with horror, representing one with little to no knowledge of the literary tradition of the mystery genre. Opting for the lowest-common denominator, she is the opposite of Haba, the would-be intellectual. The resolution she presents is one that she herself admits is lame, but has the most shock value, especially since it is the most gory of the three. Her concerns are more over the promotion of the movie and entertaining an audience. Sawaguchi represents the majority, who are only tangentially familiar with the mystery genre, and want only to be entertained through shock value.

Different though their theories may be, the three would-be detectives of Class 2-F have one major thing in common with each other: the ability to gloss over those details that weaken or outright refute their theories. Nakajou ignores a detail involving tracks made in the tall grass, saying that Hougou must have forgotten, since she visited earlier in Spring when there would have been short grass, making an escape route less detectable. He again, unknowingly, is bringing Hongou’s thought process to his own level. Haba ignores the amount of blood that Hongou requested be used as a prop. Like Nakajou, he presumes Hongou’s meaning although, instead of equating his own thoughts with Hongou’s as Nakajou did, Haba presumes his assumptions to be correct. He overrides Hongou’s decision, saying that she outright requested the wrong amount, making a mistake. Lastly, Sawaguchi ignores any and all details that conflict with her own version of the ending. Of the three, she makes it the least about what Hongou would have wanted, and more about what she presumes her audience to want from the story. She also goes as far as to suggest a ghostly culprit, directly contradicting Knox’s 10 Commandments which had previously been established, along with Sherlock Holmes, as the guidelines for Hongou’s script.

The reasons why the main Hyouka cast are drawn to mystery are also brought to light, furthering their characterization both as archetypes and as characters in their own right. Chitanda is drawn to the motivation of the scriptwriter, not caring as much about the story itself, but the emotions of the person behind the story. Fukube is drawn in by the details, mirroring his role of information-provider in the solving of mysteries. Ibara is the first to tell Houtarou of a mistake he made, but is presumably still unable to solve the mystery herself.

And what of the series’s rising deductive star, Houtarou? Lacking the typical catalyst of Chitanda’s curiosity to prod him into solving the mystery, Fuyumi Irisu from Class 2-F plays to his confidence in order to manipulate him. Reiterating what his friend Fukube had said earlier that day, Irisu tells Houtarou that he is special, allowing the last key component that makes the detective fall into place: the ego. In order to go about solving mysteries, gathering clues, making deductive connections, one first must have a sense of pride and self-confidence in order to presume that they are the right person for the task. This too has a downside, as overconfidence can easily be the downfall of a detective, especially in Houtarou’s case where he is lacking in the other key components. It is this hubris that makes him grasp to validate his incorrect conclusion in Episode 11, even in the face of contradictory evidence presented by Ibara, Fukube, and Chitanda. It’s similar, but not equivalent, to how the three Class 2-F presenters each ignored important evidence in order to support their own versions of the movie ending. No one likes to be wrong, after all.

Now, a bit of a review to tie these somewhat loosely-related ends together. Firstly, Hyouka makes a case for what is needed to create a good mystery story and a solid detective, or detective team. Secondly, the series alludes to established rules and guidelines for writing detective fiction, from the straightforward mysteries of Sherlock Holmes, to Knox’s 10 Commandments which came out of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. In Episode 11, the series also references Agatha Christie and use of narrative tricks, continuing its trend of slowly delving into more complexly-constructed mystery stories as it progresses its own story. As the main four learn more about mysteries, what is needed to solve them, and how to solve them, so do we the audience. Thirdly, it also offers suggestions as to why the mystery genre is so beloved, and different reasons why one would choose to read, or watch, a mystery.

As for other conclusions to draw from Hyouka, I’ve rambled along far too much as it is. I am only a database and as such, am hampered by my lack of deductive reasoning. Feel free to leave your deductions in the comments section.

Pour one out for Mamoru Chiba’s eye.

Last year, I began a full and complete rewatch of one of my favorite anime series, Sailor Moon. This year, I finally finished it.

I’ve previously waxed poetic on why I love Sailor Stars despite it being a bit of a disjointed mess. I’ve also written about how it’s inspired other anime visually — like the blocking of the Puella Magi Madoka Magica finale. This post isn’t about that.

Instead, it’s about another facet of why Sailor Stars is my favorite Sailor Moon season. Outside of the typical factors we use when rating anime — sensible things like animation quality, production, narrative coherency, overarching themes and symbolism — the circumstances and context of how we watched it and who with frame our emotional attachment. Nostalgia is a powerful feeling, and no other anime season inspires it in me quite like Sailor Stars due to how ridiculously difficult it was for me to watch it.

My Sailor Moon experience began in junior high school when I was ill and feverishly awake at odd hours. The English dubbed version of the first two seasons (Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon R) aired at about six in the morning, making it the perfect time to watch television while my parents were still asleep. At this point in time they had relaxed their stance on television somewhat to include seemingly everything but what I wanted to watch (Dawson’s Creek, Saturday Night Live) in order to have something to discuss with my peers, and we still did not have cable television. As a related aside, my parents, to this day, have never had cable television in their lives. They do, however, still own every single season of M*A*S*H and Gilmore Girls on DVD and watch them repeatedly.

Out of strictness was born surreptitiously videotaping the shows that I wanted to watch on videotape without their permission. The Sailor Moon dub quickly became one of those shows, despite the fact that I never asked them about it once. I just assumed that something that involved young women who were supposedly my age fighting in what could be considered somewhat questionable attire and dreaming of romances with men in university was probably not going to pass their figurative test. After watching both seasons several times, I purchased the Sailor Moon S movie on VHS and snuck it into my house. This was my first experience with raw, unedited Sailor Moon and it was glorious. My friend T, whose parents did have cable, taped the dubbed S and SuperS seasons for me when I couldn’t go over to her house to watch it, sprawling on the carpet in her living room with her cat and younger sister.

Sailor Moon SuperS was a slog. It also came out around the same time that I was preparing college applications and trying to do as many extracurricular activities as possible without collapsing. It wasn’t until the summer before my senior year in high school that I revisited Sailor Moon, not by returning to the SuperS season that I had abandoned, but by reading fan fiction on burgeoning internet communities.

It was there that I discovered the “lost season,” Sailor Moon Sailor Stars.

Presumably deemed too controversial to be aired on US television, Sailor Stars first came to me in images of the Sailor Starlights and offhanded mentions on fansites. While chatting in one of my art classes about Sailor Moon with T, another friend mentioned that she had one of the Sailor Stars DVDs. I asked her how that was possible, and she told me about a magical place in Harvard Square: an anime shop where I could rent Japanese releases for a small amount of money. The next time I took the train into Boston proper, I rented the first Sailor Stars DVD.

In addition to the odd adrenaline rush of doing something that (presumably) my parents would not want me to do, there was also the overwhelming feeling that I was watching the real version of Sailor Moon, as intended, in Japanese. It was an experience, something to be savored. I watched an episode a day and then revisited each episode several times before I took the commuter rail back into Boston and returned it for the next DVD. Each disk only had a few episodes, so going through the season was a comparatively arduous process to my current anime watching habits, which involve queueing up Crunchyroll or Netflix.

Watching Sailor Stars felt like something all my own. I could finally experience Michiru Kaioh and Haruka Tenou’s romantic relationship, not as “cousins” like the English dub wanted me to believe. I didn’t admit to myself that I was bi until much later in life but the signs were all there and in a way, Sailor Moon helped pave that path to acceptance.

Due to the transformation of the Sailor Starlights, I accepted that seeing an official release — thinking back on it now, these DVDs must have been fansubs, likely done by members of the shop staff, or perhaps people they knew from tape-trading, Sailor Moon was hardly the only anime they had available to rent — wasn’t likely in my lifetime. Now it is and I own it.

The overall experience of Sailor Stars for me cannot be divorced from this context. Sailor Stars meant a world beyond what I had seen previously, a world where Haruka and Michiru were a couple and Zoicite was a man. Sailor Stars meant popping on my snow boots, taking the commuter rail to North Station, the green line to Park Street, and the red line to Harvard. It meant hiding the DVD under the sofa until I could sneak downstairs in the middle of the night to watch it. Later, Sailor Stars meant admitting that yes, I was actually attracted to women, something that seems so simple now, but was impossible to acknowledge at the time.

Welcome to the Twelve Days of Anime project! I will (hopefully) fulfill the goal of writing one personal post a day for twelve days over the holidays discussing a personal experience with anime that I watched this year. For the curious, here are my posts from last year.

My first foray into anime blogging was a Cardcaptor Sakura Angelfire fan site. I had recently discovered the internet — thanks, in part, to Sailor Moon — and with that discovery came the subsequent unearthing of Cardcaptor Sakura, not to be confused with Cardcaptors, since the latter was, according to other fan sites, an abomination and a tragedy.

I didn’t know this myself until I managed to buy a few VHS tapes and DVDs of the original, and didn’t take a hard line on it one way or the other. The way I saw it then (and still see it to this day) was that Cardcaptors had at least introduced me to Cardcaptor Sakura. It may not have been very good, but it was an important gateway. I couldn’t bring myself to fully hate it. Yet, upon discovering the original, I felt compelled to write about it.

The site was about as awful as any free Angelfire site of the early aughts. It was pale pink with dark pink and white accents. The homepage autoplayed a midi version of the Cardcaptor Sakura opening, “Catch You, Catch Me.” It had episode writeups of both Cardcaptors and Cardcaptor Sakura, organized in airing order, where I would give my opinions on each episode that I had seen.

I never worried about whether my opinion was valid or meaningful in any way. I simply wrote.

No small amount of hubris goes into blogging. At some point between your brain and your fingers on the keyboard or voice into a microphone, you (consciously or subconsciously) make the decision that your thoughts are worth voicing. Your opinion, in some way, actually matters enough to make an effort to express.

Based on traffic and attention, my opinion didn’t “matter” until I began blogging for the now-defunct Altair & Vega. More specifically, it didn’t “matter’ until I blogged Mawaru Penguindrum weekly. As the blog became one of the destinations for Penguindrum discussion, I balked at the idea that I was an authority but I also basked in the attention and discussion. People came to the comments section to argue and submit their own theories while I chatted about art history and Kenji Miyazawa’s Night on the Galactic Railroad and the dangers of capitalism. Despite my hesitation, there was an adrenaline rush with every post and every comment response that I couldn’t ignore. I fell in love with Kunihiko Ikuhara’s works and style. Unwittingly, I had followed the man for years because he worked on almost the entirety of Sailor Moon.

When I left A&V and created this more personal blog one of the things I wanted to wholly distance myself from was a more academic “this is definitively how this is” tone. At the time, I couldn’t articulate why.

This year, I blogged Sarazanmai weekly for the majority of the series’ run. Before it even aired, I was researching kappa and otter lore, returning to Penguindrum and the kappa/otter motif Ringo Oginome’s parents. I tagged Sarazanmai’s local idol, Sara Azuma, as the series’ Greek chorus based on prior Ikuhara works. I desperately wanted to be part of the discussion as it was happening. Every week I watched the raw episode in Japanese as it aired, posted immediately after watching the subtitled version on Crunchyroll, and then wrote additional editorials during the week.

This amount of effort isn’t something you do if you wholly lack arrogance or self-importance.

It’s still difficult to articulate the difference between authoritative and enthusiastic. They all-too-often overlap. I still despise how the voices that make the most noise about objectively knowing are lifted far above subjective enjoyment. This isn’t to say that some people aren’t legitimate experts in things, but it’s how they’re viewed that sometimes bothers me. Then again, do I have a figurative leg to stand on in this discussion if I too am partially doing it for recognition?

I wonder how much people worry about whether they’re correct, or what they’re about to say before putting it out into the ether. Do they worry about “getting it right” like I do? Are they ever concerned that their opinion is silly or meaningless? These are things I worry about before every post, and it ties into the perfectionism that, for a while, kept me from blogging at all because nothing was good enough. If you’re going to do something, anything, wouldn’t you want to be the best at it?

Anime blogging is weird and, at this point in time, almost archaic. If I was doing it solely for the attention, I would have moved to YouTube ages ago. Yet I still want attention. It’s not all that serious, and perhaps ultimately meaningless, but I still am driven to write and sometimes I don’t know why.

Thank you for reading. It actually does mean a lot.

When people talk about Mob Psycho 100, they talk about bombast. They talk about spectacle. Technical excellence. They pull out a list of both established and up-and-coming animators all taking part in what is undeniably a feast for the eyes. The bones of Mob Psycho 100 are raw emotions on a page (or if you’re Miyo Sato, a piece of glass) but, to borrow a tired and frequently ill-used phrase from one Marshall McLuhan, the medium is often the message.

In other words, the “content” of Mob Psycho 100 often takes (and arguably should take, given what the series is doing in the context of the current anime space) a backseat to the medium itself. Discussion of Mob Psycho 100 is dominated by the medium and not the content. Mob Psycho 100 online discourse walks the worn path emotional narrative versus animation quality/visuals and it shouldn’t.

It shouldn’t, because Mob Psycho 100 is both in tandem.

It took me until the first episode of Mob Psycho 100‘s second season to realize this harmonious relationship between medium and content. When I initially watched the first season’s premiere, the series didn’t grab me emotionally in any way, despite being remarkably pretty. I falsely lumped it in with One Punch Man (another animators’ showcase adaptation of a ONE manga) which left me completely cold, and the online discussion primarily centered around sakuga or animation.

“Sakuga” (作画) means drawing or, more specifically, production drawing. Over the past few years, sakuga has become a catch-all term for the Japanese animator fandom, discussion of animation quality and production, and the cataloguing of animation cuts. Defining what sakuga means in western anime fandom is now difficult because of how the term has been diffused and redefined by fans to encompass so much. For a long time sakuga to me was distant and cold. It was — and honestly still is — something I didn’t feel qualified to write about, despite loving so many anime for their visuals alone. For years, sakuga was pitted against emotional narrative as if the two were at odds with each other.

They’re not.

The first episode of Mob Psycho 100‘s second season is remarkably quiet. It’s a small narrative focused around Shigeo “Mob” Kageyama’s daily life at school and introduces him to an unlikely kindred spirit in Emi, a girl who only asks Mob out as a dare from her friends. There’s remarkable emotional subtlety in the presentation of Emi’s relationship with her friend group, who aren’t presented as toxic as much as they are simply cliquey and a bit mean, like many friend groups in junior high school. Emi has a hobby that she cares about fiercely, but is forced to remain insincere about it in front of her friends. The episode’s eyecatch cleverly shows Emi with her eyes open as the leader of the group fishes for a toy from the claw machine with the other three friends grinning, eyes closed. Emi is separate.

Mob can relate and his sincerity inspires her. When he begins gathering the scattered pieces of the manuscript that Emi worked so hard on, she joins him on the ground and tells her friends to go ahead without her. There’s no shouting or bombast, just quiet strength, showcased beautifully in a nine-second-long animation cut by Itsuki Tsuchigami where Mob uses his powers to restore the torn manuscript. The “camera” rotates around Mob and Emi as paper scraps fly around them both in a way that’s reminiscent of a romantic movie climax. And while Mob and Emi’s relationship is hardly romantic, it’s cemented in this moment as a meeting of two people who have a lot more in common with each other than either of them initially thought.

At the end of this animation cut, Mob smiles and hands the reassembled story to Emi. “You see, I happen to be an esper,” he says simply, as if he’s describing his eye color or a food preference. It’s not only an unlikely display of trust to someone who is effectively an outsider to Mob’s every day life, but a hint that Mob has accepted himself. This quiet and simple scene becomes a framework for Mob’s journey through the rest of the second season, particularly his relationship with his mentor, Reigen Arataka.

I wouldn’t have given this series another chance without this perfect example of emotional narrative and animation working in unison. Like Emi herself, I get bogged down in what I hear from others, what I should care about, and how I should write about it. While I know that online discussion shouldn’t affect my personal enjoyment of a series, sometimes it does. Fortunately, the premiere of Mob Psycho 100‘s second season showed me how wrong I was.

One of the most popular songs of my adolescence was The Backstreet Boys’ “I Want It That Way.” If you actually bother to listen to the lyrics of this song they make no sense whatsoever beyond random phrases set to a catchy tune. Comprehension didn’t matter when a friend belted out “Tell me whyyyyyy” and you could immediately follow up with “Ain’t nothing but a heartache.”

Pop song lyrics are rarely the height of eloquence. In fact, it’s their simplicity coupled with the music itself — be it a soulful ballad or upbeat earworm — that makes them so effective. Sure, you may be writing about a failed relationship just like nearly every single musician and or artist does at one point or another, but that hardly matters if it manages to resonate with an audience, or the distributor has strong industry connections.

Carole & Tuesday is an amazing series for many reasons. One of them is that it recognizes this and showcases it not only through the two leads, Carole Stanley and Tuesday Simmons, but through the industry-backed model-turned-pop-idol Angela Carpenter. Angela’s debut in-universe song, “Move Mountains,” manages to be just as emotionally-affecting as Carole and Tuesday’s “Loneliest Girl” despite dramatic difference in their conception, creative process, and monetary backing. Carole & Tuesday walks a line between celebrating music wholly and completely while also being a bit cynical about the production process and who is facilitated to succeed over others (hint: it’s usually people with a lot of money).

One of the most brilliant moments of the series occurs in the third episode when Tuesday draws a comparison between spinning clothes in a washing machine. “They’re kind of like us,” Tuesday says. “They were completely still, then suddenly started moving. They had a chance encounter and got filled up with all kinds of things.” Cue both Carole and Tuesday — along with a random man who happened to be in the laundromat at the time and is initially, and rightfully, confused —  tapping their feet to create a beat and half composing a song in that moment. The full song plays over a montage of them writing it together back in their apartment, goofing off, and various objects that move in circles. It’s dumb, but wonderfully charming and showcases just how attached the two already are and how much fun they’re having making music together. As the two croon “You were the missing puzzle piece” to each other, you believe it, despite the rote and clichéd qualities of the lyric itself.

“Round and round like dancing laundry,” may not be the most lyrically amazing line ever written, but it’s fun and oddly apropos. It’s easy to relate to, even if it sounds a bit stupid, like so many pop song lyrics. The song “Round & Laundry” also piggybacks on the emotional theme of loneliness that the two express beautifully in “Loneliest Girl” even though the two songs are completely different in tone and delivery.

The cold opening of Given‘s first episode was my favorite six minutes of any anime this year. Despite not knowing anything about the story going into the series, these first six minutes floored me with their beauty and focus through framing, cinematography, and willingness to be quiet when necessary. (Too few pieces of media in general, not just anime, know how to be quiet when necessary).

Revisiting it having watched the entirety of the series showcases just how much care they put into this opening sequence.

When I first watched this episode, I was struck by the immediate focus on hands. Mafuyu Satou’s hands reach for his guitar, unplug his phone from its charger, pet the top of his dog’s head in a silent farewell, and turn a key to lock his apartment door. They clutch at his guitar as Mafuyu says he’s been having the same dream over and over again. We later learn that this dream is his memory of his former boyfriend Yuuki’s suicide. The guitar is the only thing that Mafuyu reaches out to hold onto until he meets Ritsuka. All of his other hand movements indicate a goodbye or disconnection — from his apartment, his phone charger, and his dog. Even on the train, Mafuyu doesn’t hold onto anything but the guitar. He leans against the doorway while on the train rather than using the handhold.

Ritsuka Uenoyama’s hands wave off his friend’s request to play basketball, wave at a different group of acquaintances while they’re playing basketball, reach out to open a door, and cover his mouth as he yawns. He too is disconnected from others, but it’s presented more casually — a lackluster wave or acknowledgement because he feels like he has to perform the minimum amount of social interaction required while in school. His yawns inform us of his lost passion for playing guitar before we are told anything about his band or relationship with music. The only time Ritsuka reaches out before meeting Mafuyu is to open the door that leads him to the stairwell where the two meet for the first time.

When the two meet, they begin enthusiastically reaching out to each other. Ritsuka’s hands are shown replacing the strings of Mafuyu’s guitar with an almost angry flurry of activity. From the moment pictured above, where he yells at Mafuyu for allowing his guitar strings to rust to his first chord, Ritsuka is actively reaching out to Mafuyu physically.

The chord snaps Mafuyu out of his apathy long enough to make his first purposeful move. He grabs Ritsuka by the collar and asks if Ritsuka can teach him to play. It’s the first time we see Mafuyu grasping at something that isn’t the guitar, and the first time his body isn’t physically curled inwardly.

And this is just the first six minutes of the show.

Enta, you beautiful idiotic trash child.

Of the three Sarazanmai leads, Enta Jinai was the one who received the most criticism and backlash, particularly while the series aired.

This is, in large part, because Enta is the worst.

Enta is the type of person who would take on a hall monitor or student council position to pass judgment onto others while breaking the rules himself, often in a much more calculated way. He protests Kazuki Yasaka and Toi Kuji’s actions on the grounds that they’re morally wrong, but then does even more morally dubious things when he thinks no one is watching him. He’s self-righteous in a particularly repugnant way because he preaches but rarely practices outside of keeping up necessary appearances.

This is also, in large part, why Enta is so relatable. It’s not simply that he’s not perfect, it’s that he’s actively terrible at times. His struggle with his genuine romantic interest in Kazuki doesn’t make his actions right, but it does make them understandable and deeply empathetic, especially since he obviously does some things out of the goodness of his heart and others out of petty one-upmanship and emotional manipulation.

All too often we rush to place characters (pun intended) into boxes. Boxes make them easy to understand. Boxes compartmentalize and sort characters by whether they’re primarily good or bad people. Yet, Kunihiko Ikuhara’s characters are rarely so easily sorted. Even the most “evil” of characters who work to uphold the existing status quo are often revealed as victims of societal pressures themselves. If they’re not morally grey in some way, then they are physical manifestations of the system itself, like the three judgmens of Yuri Kuma Arashi. There’s a reason why Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu are cops: they’re literally and figuratively helping a toxic system.

Enta is the type of character that forces us out of sorting characters as “good” or “bad.” He seems like he’s not as over-the-top as Kazuki (who crossdresses in a convoluted plot to be closer to his brother) or Toi (who is involved in drugs, theft, and violence all for the love of his older brother) and then he manipulates an entire situation in an attempt to emulate his daydreams. When it fails, he wonders why it failed rather than reflecting on why it was wrong. As viewers, we likely lack something as dramatic as Kazuki or Toi’s respective family problems which involve untimely car accidents and gun violence, but Enta’s problems are comparatively smaller in scope — he’s jealous of his sister’s gregarious, outgoing nature and often feels isolated and neglected — and more engaging because of this. Enta perpetuates the same toxic cycle that has consumed Reo and Mabu — he’s the most direct example of a proto-Reo/Mabu — showcasing that the most unassuming or normal of people can easily be caught up in societal bullshit. He cannot be “othered” or separated from our personal experiences as easily as someone like Toi.

Late during Sarazanmai‘s run, I wrote a defense of Enta. My feelings for this wonderful disaster of a young man have only grown since then. Here’s to you, Enta.

Some properties, combined with the general act of writing anything, make it difficult to write about them. Others, you know for a fact that you’re completely beyond your depth at explaining, due to cultural reasons or the fact that the property itself is so remarkable that anything you do say will be inadequate.

In This Corner of the World is definitely the latter. Yet, it affected me more than anything else I saw this year.

(Major spoilers below the cut.)

In This Corner of the World plops the viewer directly into the world of Suzu Urano (Suzu Hojo once she is married) and begins as a gentle slice-of-life film. We’re introduced to Suzu, her family, her penchant for drawing,

This is all leading up to events that the viewer knows, due to their existence in a distant future, and that Suzu will live through. Dates are chronicled by the movie itself, passing by slowly at times and in a flurry of repetition at others. The effect is two-fold. It plays with the audience’s pre-existing knowledge of World War II and what is about to befall Hiroshima, but it also shows how time passes for Suzu: relaxed at times (even while her country is at war), quickly at others, and by a third or fourth repetition of Suzu leading her family’s air raid routine, wearily accepting of her reality. The war slowly creeps in on Suzu as she lives her daily life, transforming her slowly. By the end of the film, the core of her personality remains, but she’s irrevocably changed, an avatar for the Japanese populace as a whole.

Moments before the bomb hits, Suzu has just reconciled with her prickly sister-in-law, Keiko Kuromura. Keiko reiterates that Suzu has always gone along with what she was supposed to do, or what she felt was her duty, and that in this case, Suzu should choose for herself whether she wants to stay in Kure with her husband or go to her own family in Hiroshima. An astute viewer knows the bomb is coming, due to the date. Suzu mentions off-handedly that she would have gone to Hiroshima sooner, if it hadn’t been for the scheduling of a doctor’s appointment.

As Suzu changes her mind and decides to stay with Keiko and the rest of her husband’s family in Kure, the bomb hits. Everything goes white. Moments later, the sound of the bomb reverberates through the Kure countryside like an earthquake. It’s reminiscent of calculating the distance of a lightning strike using the seconds between the flash of light and the sound of thunder. Confused, the family tries to tune into the radio for news, but it’s not coming in.

The emotional climax of the movie swiftly follows. After the emperor announces the Japanese surrender via a country-wide radio broadcast, all of the older women around Suzu get up and move, continuing with their lives.

Suzu is furious. 

Like Keiko said, Suzu has done everything that has been asked of her. When she was told to get married — despite not remembering ever having met her husband before — she does, moving away from her family to Kure. When she is required to learn household chores to aid her ill mother-in-law, she does to the best of her ability. When the war begins to erode at their few resources, she comes up with creative ways to feed her family. She does everything expected of her to keep herself and her family alive. When the surrender comes through, she rails out against it. The war has cost her myriad things, including family members (the extent of which she doesn’t even know yet, because she doesn’t know exactly what happened to her family in Hiroshima after the bomb) and her own arm. She yells that she still has one good arm and two good legs. What was it all for?

I’m wholly unqualified to talk about the cultural context of this film, but I can relate to Suzu in her moment of pure anger. There have been so many times, especially in recent years, where I’ve railed at things wholly beyond my control. Where I’ve asked, what is this all for? while knowing that people in power (be it government figures or mega-corporations) just don’t care.

This is where In This Corner of the World is most successful for me. It does the near-impossible task of showing systemic and societal issues through the individual — something that currently plagues our ability to have coherent conversations about anything important.

This kid.

The Promised Neverland relied on a lot of things to create suspense. Not only did each episode leave the viewer wanting more, but the series also used lighting and visual framing to best build on plot events and the main trio’s emotional state. Even when the animation itself was subpar, The Promised Neverland delivered with cinematography, which frequently did the heavy lifting when the animation could or did not.

Then there was Phil.

Phil is a four year-old boy who lived at Grace Field House. He is energetic and loud. Phil was shown in some of the series’ opening scenes, along with his Grace Field brothers and sisters. At that time, Phil is just background noise, like the rest of the children other than Emma, Ray, and Norman.

Yet, he continues to appear and reappear within the series at random moments, while the overarching narrative of Grace Field house as a human meat farm is revealed. When the trio begins listing off potential traitors in Episode 4, Phil’s name comes up on the short list due to his high test scores despite the fact that he’s only four. Phil is behind the cliffhanger between the fifth and sixth episodes — Don and Gilda are hiding in Mom Isabella’s office looking for clues when someone discovers them. Surprise! It’s Phil! He’s playing hide-and-seek. This runs parallel to Emma’s revelation that there are a series of Morse code clues in their library books. She found this fact out from, you guessed it, Phil.

The truth behind Phil is far less nefarious than the series allows you to believe — he simply figured a few things out due to his intelligence — but his existence for the majority of the series keeps us guessing and invested. We want to learn more about the central mystery, and we want to know where Phil stands. When he becomes the point person that Emma relies upon when most of the children make their grand escape, Phil fulfills his duty perfectly.

I enjoyed my time with The Promised Neverland. I’ll likely never watch it again, but will certainly watch the second season when it airs next year. Until then, I’ll remember Phil fondly.

The fact that I’ve been blogging about anime for a decade makes me feel old, but also weirdly accomplished. Despite monthly gaps, I’ve been plugging away at this blog since 2013, and at Altair & Vega before that, all in the hopes that it would somehow make me a better writer.

I don’t know if anime blogging has accomplished this goal, but it does mean I’ve watched a ton of anime over the past ten years. Most of it was admittedly mediocre and forgettable, although that became slightly less true as the years went by, due to time constraints with my job.

Every post on this blog is subjective, and I think I’ve made that abundantly clear from the get-go — it’s a personal blog about my relationship with anime, for the most part — but just in case that needs clarification, these are my opinions. The purpose of this list isn’t to be an end-all, be-all decree of the absolute and objectively best anime of the past decade. It’s to list my personal favorites and why I enjoyed them so much.

Without further adieu, here are my honorable mentions for the past decade. Only television series will be included in this project with the criteria that they must have begun on January 1, 2010, or later. These are the series that didn’t quite make the final cut into my top ten for a variety of reasons, but I still loved them enough for a special shout-out, or reasoning behind why they didn’t quite make the cut.

Wandering Son (2011)

The only reason that Wandering Son is not in my top ten is that I think it’s much better as a manga than it is an anime. This is not the fault of the anime, which is wonderfully crafted and emotionally-affecting, but simply that the manga gives so much more context and nuance to the all-important interpersonal relationships in this story. I don’t even disagree with the production decision of where the anime begins and ends — it’s the perfect slice of the whole — but the story in its entirety is even better than what the anime achieves.

Both the anime adaptation and Takako Shimura’s manga tackle the confusion that not only comes with adolescence, but also with being queer and transgender with a deft touch. Shuichi Nitori’s transition and her emotional narrative throughout the story are treated with the weight and seriousness they deserve, while also building on realistic conflicts that occur and resolving them in a way that never feels preachy or inappropriate. Perhaps the greatest accomplishment of Wandering Son is that, at times, certain characters say or do awful things but they’re willing to listen and learn from the mistakes that they make. Naturally, this won’t happen with everyone you meet in life, but the fact that these kids, once educated, are genuinely accepting is a hopeful and uplifting note that is much appreciated.

Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight (2018)

Admittedly, I started watching this because I wanted to follow one of Kunihiko Ikuhara’s many pupils, Tomohiro Furukawa, in his directorial debut. What I received was an amazing story that celebrates Japan’s Takarazuka Revue while simultaneously denigrating the toxicity it can breed.

Revue Starlight falls short of being a masterpiece, but it’s a fantastic show with a lot to say about being queer, the Takarazuka Revue, and the Revue’s influence in Japan (both positive and negative). It ends in a cathartic final stage that also has the audacity to point at the audience and remind them that they’re hardly innocent bystanders, they’re complicit in perpetuating this existing cycle too. With more deliberation and a rewatch, this may end up in my top ten somewhere down the road. Revue Starlight was the most difficult series to cut from the list.

Further Reading:

The Melancholy of a Musumeyaku — Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight’s Claudine Saijou

The Melancholy of a Musumeyaku (Part Two) — Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight’s Karen Aijou

The true giraffe was inside of us all along (or the Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight finale)

When Past was Future: the goddesses of Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight’s ‘Starlight’

Made In Abyss (2017)

I love action-adventure series, but they don’t often hold my attention as much as dramas or even slice-of-life shows. All-too-often, they rely on hooking you episode-by-episode, eagerly awaiting the next installment simply so you can find out what happens next. For example, while I blogged and thoroughly enjoyed The Promised Neverland this year, it’s nowhere near one of my favorite series of the decade, and I probably won’t watch it again.

Made In Abyss is the exception to this. It’s beautiful and haunting. I’ve already returned to this series several times, despite the fact that it has some genuinely nauseating scenes. What begins as a simple hero’s journey story of Riko delving into the mysterious abyss in search of her famous mother, Lyza, becomes a treatise on human curiosity and a nod at Dante’s Divine Comedy. Throughout the series run it’s eerie and visually-stunning with top-tier cinematography and an excellent soundtrack that serves as another companion to Riko and Reg as they descend.

Further Reading:

A Mother’s Gift: More on Made in Abyss and post-apocalyptic fiction

In defense of Kou Yoshinari’s creatures in Made in Abyss

Made in Abyss on insatiable human curiosity

Layers of storytelling in Made in Abyss

Messages from the Abyss

Made in Abyss on “The Return”

Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2010)

Madoka Magica does a lot of amazing things and explores the (admittedly sigh-inducing) concept of “dark magical girl” like no other series that came before or after. It’s ultimately hopeful and upbeat but never overly saccharine. Madoka is, in so many ways, an absolutely perfect celebration of the magical girl genre and everything it embodies.

Unfortunately, and this is a flaw of mine, not anyone else’s, it’s still impossible for me to separate Madoka from the obnoxious discourse that surrounded it while airing. (Sorry, Madoka is not a deconstruction and people would know this if they A: knew what a deconstruction actually is and B: had watched any other magical girl series besides this one.) That’s why it didn’t make my top ten. As a precursor to potential angry comments, I’ll reiterate that this is in no way a flaw of the series itself.

As an aside, Madoka is also notable for coming out during the weird transition period between legal English subtitles and fansubs. Its delayed release due to the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake meant that pretty much every anime fan who was watching anything currently-airing at the time was eagerly awaiting and refreshing their browsers for the raws to come out, just to see how the story would end, which is hilarious to think about now in 2019.

Further Reading: 

Madoka, Madoka, and Me

Polar Bear Café (2012)

Alright I know what you’re thinking, “Wow, this is a kids show about talking animals. Why is it here?”

If you’re actually thinking this, then you’ve likely never experienced the magic of Polar Bear Café. 

Of all the anime I’ve shown to friends this decade, especially friends that aren’t into anime either as much as I am or at all, Polar Bear Café is one of the stickiest. Not only do people like it, but they actually continue watching it or rewatch it. There’s very little to dislike and it’s such an easy watch that there’s no pressure if you decide to skip an episode or two, or don’t watch it for an extended period of time. Polar Bear Café is the series I return to when I’m feeling depressed or sad and it has yet to fail to raise my spirits, even if it’s only a little bit. There are also some surprisingly poignant moments within the series, and by the end of it, you too may shed a tear when Mr. Penguin “flies.”

It’s no coincidence that Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu were marketed as a couple well before Sarazanmai‘s first episode aired.

It’s also no coincidence that they were cops.

Of Kunihiko Ikuhara’s works, Sarazanmai featured the most elaborate pre-release marketing strategy. It included a Twitter account run by both Reo and Mabu called @keeponly1luv and a short manga called Reo and Mabu~ Together They Are Sarazanmai.

Many Ikuhara series have come with an accompanying manga as part of a multimedia package, but in the unique case of Sarazanmai, Reo and Mabu is not a retelling of the anime’s storyline. Instead it very specifically appears to be set prior to the events of the anime, making it a prequel to the series. Reo and Mabu is a fairly fluffy slice-of-life one-shot that, while weird and esoteric at times, presents Reo and Mabu as a canonically gay couple who raise a baby they find in the street: Sara Azuma. It’s an easy read, easy on the eyes, and a generally cute BL manga. This is the first part of Sarazanmai‘s pre-release marketing strategy: market Reo and Mabu in a traditional, easily-accepted manner.

Reo and Mabu’s Twitter account is a bit trickier to parse — especially since the tweets have since been deleted completely — and shows how societal factors slowly seep and poison their relationship. Their joint Twitter journey begins innocuously with a tweet from Mabu on Nov. 11, 2018 that reads “We’re going to keep law and order in Asakusa” with an accompanying blurry Mabu selfie and location pin. Ten minutes later, Reo tweets from the account and asks why he’s tweeting, while also calling Mabu out for the blurry picture.

Their social media presence continues in this manner with both policemen tweeting seemingly meaningless snapshots of their daily patrols from the account. Slowly, things like the kawauso heart symbol and the Katakana “a” (ア) begin to creep into photo backgrounds and mobile devices. Mabu’s last tweet comes on March 30, 2019, 12 days before the series airs. The subsequent two tweets feature Reo frantically searching for Mabu, and saying that he won’t let go of his desire. On March 31, 2019, the @keeponly1luv account disappears.

There is a lot of interesting speculation regarding this Twitter timeline (especially it’s “true” chronology, which has been pinpointed to approximately 2007-8 but what I want to specifically focus on for this post is how it markets Reo and Mabu together. While the manga is slice-of-life fluff, the social media account tells a more fraught story of their relationship, with the sinister edge that they are policing Asakusa.

Within the series, Reo and Mabu are together in that they’re partnered together at their job, but state of their romantic relationship is unclear. They don’t communicate with each other despite both doing things for the other that they believe to be for the best, all while policing Asakusa deviants in the name of a faceless corporation.

The most obvious reason for Reo and Mabu’s existence is to show how a toxic societal system employs the very people it’s designed to keep down. Unlike the Judgmens of Yuri Kuma Arashi who reside in the (figurative and literal) Wall of Severance and are the system itself, Reo and Mabu are both victims of a capitalist system that exploits them and are made complicit in punishing people “like them.” Their stage song “Kawausoiya” features them dancing in front of a factory line of other people’s desires, which they take and market in the most palatable way possible much like, well, the way their own manga was marketed prior to the series.

This isn’t to say that Reo and Mabu can’t have their happiness, or their fluffy slice-of-life moments. In fact, the series gives them a happy ending where they become rickshaw drivers rather than policemen. But the softer, pared-down version of their relationship isn’t all that Reo and Mabu are as characters or as a couple, it’s simply the most marketable.

To this day, my cellphone wallpaper is Gatchaman Crowds‘ Hajime Ichinose. She’s pulling a confused look as fellow gatchaman team member Sugune Tachibana admits that he only uses his phone for calls.

Calls are the feature of my phone that I use the least, for the record.

Before delving into the series a bit and why it’s one of my favorite of the decade, it’s important to note that Gatchaman Crowds (more specifically, the first season) hasn’t aged well at all. In many ways, its technology and ideas about social media are already as anachronistic as a corded phone in a Macross or Gundam series from the 1990s. If it weren’t for insight‘s existence, despite my love for Crowds‘ initial season, it probably wouldn’t have made my top ten. insight builds on important themes about gamification, social media, and technology while admitting that some of the initial thoughts put forth by Hajime in the first season are flawed. Together, the two seasons make up a more complete but still imperfect, whole.

Despite the series’ many flaws, a lot of Gatchaman Crowds and Gatchaman Crowds insight is not only still relevant but also interesting. Hajime says the iconic Gatchaman transformation line “Bird Go” with such irreverence and genuine confusion that it comes out as, “Bird . . . go??” That was precisely the moment in my initial viewing of the series, that I was sold, and one of the moments that still stands out in a rewatch because Crowds is already screaming at you that it’s effectively abandoning a lot of what the franchise did before.

Crowds was met with initial backlash from Gatchaman fans when it aired and I think that backlash would only be worse now, with how social media has advanced in a mere six years, something that insight itself comments on in a broader fashion, about two years after the first season of Crowds. As a related aside, a lot of my blog posts that I wrote about Crowds, especially the initial 2013 season, now seem archaic and naive. I would certainly write them a bit differently were I watching the series for the first time today.

Thinking back on the series now, and having rewatched it more than a few times, what I appreciate most in Crowds is it’s fundamental optimism, even in the face of extreme awfulness from others. It’s far easier in storytelling to point at the world and talk about how it’s all toxic and horrible without finding a light of hope than it is to find that hope and hold onto it. This doesn’t mean that I don’t scoff at a lot of things that happen in Crowds — especially on each successive rewatch as the so-called real world seems closer and closer to the edge of a precipice — or disagree with them, but in the end there is catharsis and hope, and that’s a lot more difficult to do than just pointing out the bad. At the end of it all, I still agree with this passage that I wrote after watching it.

“I’m not judging them, because I am also culpable. Going along with the atmosphere isn’t as obvious as hugging an oddly-shaped alien-creature. It’s shrugging off or acquiescing to what others say, even if you strongly disagree. It’s throwing in an odd insult against someone whom you actually have nothing against for the sake of fitting in. It’s not helping out someone because it goes against what the popular opinion dictates. It’s ridiculously easy.”

There are also a few external factors that went into two seasons of Gatchaman Crowds placing above other series like Madoka Magica or Made In Abyss, an act considered sacrilege by many anime fans. Crowds was the first series that really hooked me after having started this solo blog. It was also the first show since From the New World where I felt compelled to watch it and discuss it almost immediately after airing. Through Crowds, I was part of my first larger anime conversation as myself and not as a member of a larger blog. These factors are why this series will likely mean more to me than others.

Further Reading: 

In Defense of Hajime Ichinose, Gatchaman

The world your word is we are not alone . . . in the confusion over the Gatchaman Crowds opening song lyrics

Avant-Garde, Kitsch, and a Return to Gatchaman Crowds

The Red Ranger: Tsubasa Misudachi vs. Hajime Ichinose

Opening the Social Media Pandora’s Box: Rui Ninomiya and Rhythm Suzuki

The Disappearance of Hajime Ichinose

In Defense of Tsubasa Misudachi

A Delicate Ray of Light: Gel Sadra and Reading the Atmosphere

The Girl and the Atmosphere

When you’re a hot-shot television producer but you forget your business cards so you just end up yelling.

I’ve made no secret of how much I love Sailor Moon Sailor Stars, and how important it was to me at a formative age. This year, I finished a full rewatch of it. Unbeknownst to high school me, Sailor Stars also introduced me to two influential and creative anime directors who came from what people now call the Kunihiko Ikuhara tree or school: Junichi Sato and Takuya Igarashi.

This is, first and foremost, a Sailor Iron Mouse appreciation post.

Many have tried to follow in the footsteps of Sailor Iron Mouse — Igarashi’s Star Driver had Midori Okamoto/Professor Green, who preyed on her students, and other Sailor Moon villains have acted very similarly — but few have been as successful or hilarious. There’s something about a tiny woman in a mafia pinstripe suit picking out people that she thinks are hot and then taking their star seeds. She doesn’t have it all together, and her clumsiness makes her existence rife for the type of visual gags that Igarashi loves to throw into his series.

Sailor Iron Mouse is not only great, but she brings out the best in Igarashi (Ojamajo Doremi, Star Driver, Ouran High School Host Club, Bungou Stray Dogs) and Sato (Ojamajo Doremi, Kaleido Star, Aria, Princess Tutu), allowing them to showcase visual quirks that end up in their works for years to come.

Takuya Igarashi is one of my favorite anime directors. He hasn’t always been successful (Captain Earth, arguably Sailor Stars itself) but is capable of stunning visuals and effective visual gags. Junichi Sato is most well-known for the Aria series, but has also had great success with slower-paced, contemplative slice-of-life series like Amanchu! (another anime adaptation of Aria mangaka Kozue Amano), and Tamayura. The two helmed the wonderful Ojamajo Doremi together.

Igarashi has two Sailor Iron Mouse episodes: one responsible for her initial introduction, and the other her final “standard” episode (although he was also series director, so likely had some hand in most of the episodes). Sato receives the episode that follows, our final, and hilarious, farewell to Sailor Iron Mouse before her boss, Galaxia, kills her.

In this rewatch, I was struck that it was Sato who used more obvious visual gags, playing up how rotary phones (Sailor Iron Mouse’s method of contacting her boss) were stalking her as her time was running out. While on the train she sees a poster for the Three Lights and remarks that of course it would be them, underlining how obvious her targets were this entire time (effectively breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience). He puts Haruka and Michiru in corny matching couple outfits, and also gives Seiya Kou an “SOS” shirt when they talk to an injured Usagi Tsukino.

Meanwhile, Igarashi uses fewer gags but focuses on the distance, and growing closeness, between Usagi and Seiya by isolating them from each other or placing them side-by-side.

The two episodes work perfectly in tandem together, including visual through lines that highlight the aforementioned distance and genuine romantic tension between Usagi and Seiya, gags with Usagi’s leg being injured twice (once in Igarashi’s episode and then again in Sato’s episode) due to her general clumsiness, and a lot of Sailor Iron Mouse facial reactions that are very similar to what the two would go on to do with Ojamajo Doremi.

I was on board with Sarazanmai as soon as I heard it existed. If Kunihiko Ikuhara (Sailor Moon S, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Mawaru Penguindrum, Yuri Kuma Arashi) is attached to a project, it’s a guarantee that I will not only watch it, but likely have a lot to say about it because he’s a director who never does anything without something specific to say. Sarazanmai is no different.

That being said, Sarazanmai is (spoilers, but not really if you’ve read anything on this blog ever) the lowest-ranked Ikuhara series on this decade list. A lot of it is an inherent course-correction against recency bias. I mentioned this in the Honorable Mentions post when talking about Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight, but it’s more difficult to rate more recent series with less time between an initial viewing and this write-up, as well as less time to rewatch it.

Currently, Sarazanmai stands as my least-favorite Ikuhara series, which still makes it one of my favorite anime series in existence, and easily the best anime of 2019. I still have no fewer than eight completely spoiler-filled posts that will inevitably end up on here some day soon after another rewatch.

For the record, upon first viewing I thought Yuri Kuma Arashi felt a bit rushed, but have since grown to enjoy it significantly more than I did when it aired. Sarazanmai seemed even more rushed while I was watched it, despite obviously having a lot to say. The story of Reo Niiboshi and Mabu Akutsu remains the most glaring example within the series, since their manga and social media backstory gives so much more to their weight in the narrative.

Admittedly, I now love Yuri Kuma Arashi having watched it multiple times since its 2015 run, and I think it will also continue to resonate with me a bit more personally than Sarazanmai simply due to the fact that I’m a queer woman and not a queer man.

Like Yuri Kuma Arashi, Sarazanmai is significantly shorter than Ikuhara’s other works (which have been receiving progressively fewer episodes through the years). It follows Ikuhara’s template and uses repetition as (and in certain ways even more) effectively as any of his previous works. Unlike Penguindrum (in-universe covers of Japanese rock group ARB) or Utena (different songs that play during the series’ episodic duels) Sarazanmai employs a more musical theatre approach with characters actively singing out their desires and roles, which neatly slots into Ikuhara’s style as well as the Greek chorus elements he’s employed for years. I dare anyone who watches this series to not let an audible “Kawausoiya!” slip at one point or another.

Above all else, Sarazanmai is about human connections and how major corporations exploit and market those connections. All three of Sarazanmai‘s main characters — Kazuki Yasaka, Toi Kuji, and Enta Jinai — reach out to each other in a variety of ways only to find out that their connections have been severed, perverted, or commodified in some way. Reo and Mabu’s entire narrative arc is about how they’ve already been corrupted and forced to police the societal system that ruined their lives. Ikuhara’s Tokyo Sky Metro line (Penguindrum) that progress shouldn’t be made simply for the sake of progress is back in full force with the idea that the future isn’t always sparkling. We cannot dwell on the pain of our past, but to forget it completely is equally dangerous, especially when it comes as a solution to that pain, in stamped “Kappazon” boxes.

Further Reading:

Sarazanmai Episodics

In defense of Sarazanmai’s Enta Jinai (sort of)

The Marketing of Reo and Mabu