In the first half of Penguindrum, we learned that each of the characters appeared to be existing in a wholly different reality from the characters around them. On the first disk of the second half of Penguindrum, we learn why.

Himari’s health takes a turn for the worse, but that is set on the back burner, as bizarrely beautiful and immediately untrustworthy Sanetoshi-sensei inserts himself into the story, confirming our belief that there are separate, but intertwined, realities colliding here.

Shoma and Ringo confess their realities to one another, only to find that they are the same reality, which makes everything worse. Ringo get caught up in Yuri’s reality. Yuri, while living up to her name, turns out to be a broken and unhappy person, twisted by parental abuse and grief. Yuri’s backstory is absolutely agonizing and horrific to watch. The repeated concept of abusive father who smokes a pipe is starting to worry me, frankly.

But slowly, these realities all start to coalesce around one person and it feels like it all might make sense. Did Momoka change reality? That would explain a lot.  That almost makes sense until Masako and Mario’s story pops up. They have their own reality, but is any of it related to anything else? And what is Dr. Sanetoshi’s part in all this?

The most maddening thing about watching an anime by Ikuhara in full throttle is the unshakable feeling that, even when it’s all over, and all the pieces have been played, you may never really understand anything at all.

Collection 2 is going to have a lot more screaming, a lot more adults being horrible to children and more not-quite-matching realities.

Sentai’s translation and technicals are both not noticeable, which is exactly what one wants out of them. Rather than thinking about word choices, I find myself  scanning the visuals for more meaningless symbology like the cats, the arrows, cars, towers, (what does Michaelaneglo’s David as a tower mean, really?) apples and, of course penguins. Does any of it have any meaning at all, or does it just look good? Maybe we’ll find out. Maybe not.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8, but super grim, with a side order of misery
Characters -7  Shoma and Ringo become more real, while everyone else becomes a pulp fiction version of themselves
Yuri – 8 It’s all yucky, but it’s there
Service – 5

Overall – 8 A hard watch, a tense watch, but a compelling watch.

Many thanks once again to Okazu Superhero Eric P. for sponsoring today’s review!

The first volume of Penguindrum comes to a close in Disk 3, by introducing two major plot complications, several new visual symbols and a twist of fate. Or should I say…destiny?

We learn in a most roundabout way possible why Natsume Masako is after the diary. We see that Himari has a separate history of her own, a story about which she carries guilt, regret and unhappiness in great measure. And at last, we learn what really binds all the characters together…but not why. Not yet.

Visually, we’re noticing some new symbols, most especially Tokyo Tower, which now appears in many scenes. The storytelling to come is so powerful that merely seeing the Tower made me shiver (with what emotions, I can’t tell you – that would be spoiling it.)  The appearance of repeated, unexplained visual symbols laden with inexpressible meaning is the very essence of a Ikuhara Kunihiko production.

I’m watching the DVD of the series, as opposed to the Blu-ray, (and I’ve previously pointed out, I’ve got an ancient TV and that I’m not a great judge of video quality) but I still think the video is crisp.  I can imagine that on Blu-Ray, especially on a good screen, the video’s saturation of color and play of light and dark would be quite amazing.

I haven’t addressed the issue of translation. Sentai is generally adequate. They lack a translator with nuance, but for the bulk of the story, nuance is left out of the dialogue. The words Sanetoshi speaks are not where the nuance is, it’s they way he’s saying them and where he is and what he’s doing when he does. Luckily for us, since Sentai is generally adequate.

The thing I wanted very much to bring to your attention today is this – the song being blasted by the speakers that deafen Kanba is a Welsh folksong called Ar Hyd y Nos, also known by the English title, All Through The Night.  It’s a pretty famous hymn and lullaby and I wanted you to hear and enjoy it in a non-distorted version. Here is Aled Jones singing it in Welsh and English:

Which makes me wonder, why Ar Hyd y Nos? Doesn’t it strike you as odd that Ikuhara and his team would choose a Welsh folksong to blast at Kanba? But then, Ikuhara likes odd conjunctions of mismatched emotions. So, yeah. ^_^

Ratings:

Overall – 8

Once again, thanks so much to Okazu Superhero Eric P. for his generous sponsorship of today’s review!

And welcome to the new Okazu. Hope you like it! ^_^