Archive for the English Anime Category


The Aquatope on White Sand, 2nd Cour

December 19th, 2021

If you have not yet read it (or need a refresher,) please consider taking a look at Megan’s terrific review of the first cour of this series.

After a tumultuous and emotional first half, The Aquatope on White Sand (streaming on Crunchyroll) has returned. Kukuru and Fuuka’s story continues in ways that surprise and delight and, in its final moments, gave us the absolute rightest ending for this story.

As the second cour opens up, the folks from Gama Gama have taken positions at Tingala Aquarium, a new, shiny and vastly better-resourced aquarium than Gama Gama ever was. Tingala, (which means ‘galaxy’ in Okinawan,) is built to present an immersive experience of the oceans, rather than “creature in small tanks.” It does not escape me that this is a brilliant metaphor for Kukuru and Fuuka’s experiences. They had been in a very small tank and are now being immersed into a much wider world, in preparation for entry into the ocean of life.

The story begins with a summation of the growing pains the Gama Gama team as a whole are having. Tingala staff is a well-oiled machine and they all have to learn to work within the new system in a way they had not really prepared (had not been prepared) for. But Fuuka is first to find her new place. Having decided for herself that is what she wants to do…she does it.  Which leaves Kukuru.

Kukuru expects to take care of the sealife as she had, but instead is assigned to marketing under a very unpleasant director.

Let me digress here. As an adult, I place the blame for Kukuru’s unhappiness through much of this cour on the heads of the two aquarium directors of Gama Gama and Tingala – both of whom had plenty of time to explain what they were thinking about Kukuru’s future. There was literally no need at all for Kukuru to doubt herself, her skills, her creativity or her life choices, when “I’m putting you in marketing so you can learn about other aspects of running a large/new/progressive aquarium, to build on your knowledge of taking care of the creatures here.” would have sufficed. I am very angry at these two old men who made her suffer needlessly because, probably, that was the way they learned. It’s a stupid way.

A large chunk of thise cour is watching Kukuru struggle under that apparently petty rule of a man who has strong opinions and is completely incapable of managing a team that needs managing. He’s not wrong, his ideas are good, but the petty tyrant method of management is bullshit. He almost breaks Kukukru…why? So we spend a lot of time watching Kukuru ground down. Fuuka jumps in to help solve a number of problems all at once, buy creating a girls’ day out for various team members who need help breaking through their funks.

The girls day episode also solves the one real conflict Fuuka herself is confronted with, thus proving my point above – talking with people helps resolve issues. The way in which Chiyu is set up as an antagonist, so that we are forced to feel exactly what Fuuka feels when she learns the whole story, was a masterstroke of story telling.

Kukuru’s struggle is not lessened as time goes on. I wondered about this as I watched the anime. It’s a bit like randori in martial arts – conflict keeps coming at you, and you just have to keep figuring out how to not go down. But randori is for practice and not meant to be real. The resolution of Kukuru’s randori comes in the form of opportunity for her to change her circumstances.

And that opportunity will change everything for not just Kukuru, but also Fuuka and others at Tingala. Once again, our two protagonists are asked to look at their choices and imagine a future for themselves. Only this time, their choices are vastly different. If the theme of the first cour was endings, then the theme here has got to understood as beginnings.

The animation by PA Works was breathtaking. With a bigger aquarium, and more scenery shots than before, the animation team just animated their hearts out. It never felt unreal, but the scenes often felt slightly realer than real, which is its own unreality.

Lastly, let’s talk about Fuuka and Kukuru. I know a lot of reviewers said they felt Yuri vibes about their relationship. As Megan pointed out, the first cour somewhat heavy-handed this intoa “sister” relationship in. My interpretation is that nether and both of these are correct. These two strangers, brought together by chance, become friends. Shared experience and trial bring them closer together while we watch. The sister thing might seem awkward, but. We don’t really have a way to ask “I’d like to be something more to you than a friend,” really, without it sounding like being asked to become lovers. This series has Fuuka and Kukukru developing a deep relationship and we just don’t have a word in English for it beyond family. I have many friends I love deeply and, yes, consider family. So, sisters, yes.

When we turn to the second cour, they again act as each other’s strength at least once. But they are still so much in a process of becoming who they are, I’m actually uncomfortable labeling their affection and love as romantic. It doesn’t feel like it is to me…but, it feels like it maybe, could become, one day. As an iteration of a platonic love, I find Fuuka and Kukuru’s relationship relatable and inspiring. I’d love to see a lot more of that. We need more complexity in women’s relationships shown in media. Women’s relationships are not limited to a handful of roles. The ending of the series gives us two people who might be that for one another and equally may not, and either way works for me. 

One last comment, for a wholesome and “healing” (iyashikei) anime, I cried a lot through this series, because it was so often extremely beautifully written, as well as animated. One point off for that, because I really hate crying. ^_^

Ratings:

Story – 9
Art – 9
Characters – 9
Yuri – This has got to be up to personal interpretation. Where Megan saw 6, I saw 0 with a “possible” in the future.
Service – 1 On principle, mostly

Overall – 9

A wonderful anime from beginning to end and very worth watching. I hope it inspires some folks to care about the world’s oceans.





The Aquatope on White Sand, 1st Cour, Guest Review by Megan

October 27th, 2021

Welcome to our record-breaking 7th guest review in 2 months! This is made possible entirely through the support of our Okazu Patrons and the energy and talent of our guest reviewers! I’m absolutely delighted to bring you so many guest reviews and hope that, if you enjoy these, you’ll become an Ozazu Patron and help us continue to pay our writers industry standard rates for their efforts!

Today we’re bringing back Megan with a thoughtful and lovely look at one of this years prettiest anime, The Aquatope on White Sand, streaming now on Crunchyroll. (I asked to cover the second cour myself, so we’ll be back early next year season to talk about the rest of it. ^_^) In the mean time, please welcome Megan back! The mic is yours, Megan.

The Summer 2021 anime season saw the debut of not one, but two Yuri anime from fan favourite studios. Season 2 of Dragon Maid drew most of the attention, but the original 2-cour series from PA Works studio, The Aquatope on White Sand, also quickly drew a Yuri audience.  

Aquatope begins with a young woman, Fuuka, leaving her idol job in Tokyo after she gave an opportunity up for another member of the group. Her dream is over, but on a whim she takes a flight to Okinawa where she meets Kukuru, the acting director of Gama Gama aquarium. With only weeks to go before the planned closure of the aquarium, Fuuka decides to support Kukuru with her dream of keeping Gama Gama open. 

The entire cast is likeable, but the bulk of development goes to our leads, Fuuka and Kukuru. Fuuka is kind, almost to a fault; both with her idol and aquarium jobs, she prioritises others’ dreams above her own. Her arc sees her grow in confidence and learn to pursue her own dream again. Kukuru was the bigger surprise of the two leads. From the promo material and first episode I didn’t expect her to be quite as serious and focused on her work as the aquarium’s director as she turned out to be. The dynamic between the girls also works out differently than you might expect at first: in the early episodes Kukuru is the one giving emotional support to Fuuka as she faces up to her mother in episode 5, but in the second half of this first cour Fuuka emerges as the more mature of the pair. 

While the show’s first half doesn’t definitively commit to a friendship or romance reading for Fuuka and Kukuru’s relationship (the show’s awkward attempt in episode 9 to advance a “big sister” interpretation for Fuuka is one of the writings’ rare missteps), either way there is a lot to offer here for Yuri viewers. Aquatope depicts the pair’s emotional intimacy beautifully, with both their emotional and physical closeness growing as they support each other with running the aquarium and overcoming their own issues. Wherever the second half of the show takes them, here’s hoping they have a future together. 

The other main character of Aquatope could be said to be the aquarium itself. When the first episode aired and included a magical realist scene of Fuuka getting swept up in an underwater vision, I was sceptical since the show seemed otherwise well-grounded, but the magical element ended up working in the show’s favour. The pairing of an aquarium with these ineffable magical visions makes thematic sense; even now, so much of the sea is still a mystery to us. In several episodes we also meet characters who have visions at the aquarium that help them move on from turning points in their lives. Along with the stories of the supporting cast, this helps build a connection to Gama Gama as a place that feels worth saving. 

The aquarium feels like a believable location thanks to the fantastic animation effort from PA Works. Where Aquatope might lack in impressive “sakuga” sequences, it makes up for with a consistent high quality both in the character and background art throughout these first 12 episodes. The fish are mostly rendered in CGI, but it looks acceptable, and closeups and the penguins are animated in 2D. Particular praise should be given to the background art team, Gama Gama and surroundings were so well-rendered they came off as real places. 

Spoiler warning: Please skip past the section starred off below, if you prefer to remain spoiler-free.

 

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For a “iyashikei” (healing) anime, Aquatope often struck a serious, even melancholic note from the early episodes. The closing episodes of this first cour paid off these hints, and secured my recommendation of the show for mature anime viewers who find it increasingly hard to relate to the teen-centered themes of most anime. The first cour of Aquatope is about the experience that, perhaps as much as any other, defines becoming an adult: giving up your dream. 

It testifies to the show’s strong writing, no matter how much we as the viewer might wish for a different outcome, the closure of Gama Gama feels like a logical conclusion to everything that came before. We’d seen how unsuccessful Kukuru’s initiatives to draw visitors to the aquarium had been, and episode 10 introduces a new, much larger and more centrally located aquarium opening up that renders Gama Gama aquarium irrelevant. In truth, the writing had been on the wall since the start, and Kukuru locking herself up in the aquarium as a typhoon beats down her attempts to fortify the building is an effective visual for both Kukuru and perhaps the viewer’s denial of the reality of the imminent closure. 

The finality of episode 12 is surprising for a two-cour show. Many people I know watching week-by-week thought it actually was the final episode and were surprised to find out it was only the halfway point. For viewers who usually like their anime on the shorter side, the first cour presents a satisfying and complete story on its own, without the meandering some other two-cour anime can fall prey to, with almost every episode developing the leads and their relationship, or the aquarium setting itself in important ways. This pacing helps Aquatope to feel, in my experience, more consistently engaging than some other similar anime, including PA Works’ prior series about working women such as Sakura Quest. 

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Aquatope presents a moving and mature story of pursuing and giving up dreams, and of the leads’ growing emotional intimacy. The show is shaping up to be a new favourite for slice of life and Yuri viewers, and I can highly recommend giving this overlooked anime a try. 

 

Ratings: 

 

Story – 9, a well-written and smartly paced story of giving up your dream, and what comes next Characters – 8, everyone is likeable and the leads get some good development 

Art – 9, a consistently beautiful effort by PA Works 

Yuri – 6, nothing explicitly romantic but the leads’ emotional intimacy is lovely 

Service – 1, a beach episode with the girls in swimwear, otherwise, no 

Overall – 9 

 

PS It took me a while to figure out what the word “Aquatope” means. I was reading vol 3 of (excellent and very queer-inclusive fantasy LN series) Reign of the Seven Spellblades, which used the word “Biotope”, a word similar to “habitat”. So “Aquatope”, I presume, means “aquatic habitat”. 

Thanks as always for reading my review! I’m looking forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments ^_^ 

Erica here: Thank you so much, Megan! Your thoughts echo my own completely. It’s a beautiful anime with some strong values and lessons that are both gentle and inexorable. I’m looking forward to covering the second cour. It’s a bit selfish of me, but I wanna write about this lovely anime, too! ^_^





Blue Reflection Ray, Guest Review by Aurakin

October 20th, 2021

Very excited to welcome you back today to Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu! Today we welcome a new reviewr to our family. Aurakin will be taking us through the recent anime Blue Reflection Ray, based on the game, streaming now on Funimation. As you know, I love having guest reviews. It broadens the amount and kind of content we can have, provides different perspectives, and gives us a chance to support writers. If you enjoy Guest reviews and want to help us keep paying our writers industry standard rates, consider becoming an Okazu Patreon.

Welcome Aurakin – the floor is yours!

*Note: Blue Reflection Ray is based on the game Blue Reflection. Since I haven’t played it, I won’t be making any comparisons.*

Ruka Hanari struggles to make friends. She is scarred by an event in her past, and finds herself unable to reach out to others. Along comes her new roommate, Hiori Hirahara, a girl who seems able to do everything Ruka can’t. Hiori is friendly and easy-going, and Ruka finds herself drawn in. One day, as they are casually walking down the street, they get caught in a distorted reality, and Hiori senses a girl in danger. They encounter two magical girls engaged in a sword fight, with an unconscious girl being held hostage. As the victim is about to fall off a roof-top, Hiori leaps forward to help – and suddenly transforms. 

My first impression of the art style and animation was that it looked terribly cheap. The occasional 3D effects clashed with the overly sparse 2D line art and flat colors used in the rest of the show. While the studio might have suffered from the pandemic in some areas, the art style itself seems to be more of a stylistic choice rather than a lack of resources, considering what the original character designer, Mel Kishida, has worked on previously (22/7, So-Ra-No-Wo-To). 

Being a big fan of both magical girls and yuri, I was really curious about Blue Reflection Ray. It took about six episodes for it to get interesting, but once it did, I found it both charming and entertaining. The anime shone brightly whenever it delved deeper into the characters’ backstories and the bonds they were forming with each other. Watching their everyday interactions was sweet and heartwarming. The surface plot and magical intrigues seemed to pale in comparison – that has all been done so many times before, and Blue Reflection Ray didn’t add anything new or interesting to the mix.

It’s also worth noting that this anime deals with mental illness, self-harm and abuse – sometimes poorly. And with that, I have to briefly mention Masochist Uta, the single worst thing about the show. Uta lives for pain – whether it’s her own or causing it to others – and being the intensely rapey villain she is, often groping her victims or making sexualized threats, Uta alone was enough for me to strongly consider dropping this show on several occasions. Her character does get explored more in depth later in the series, but never enough to redeem her presence.

So, how about the yuri content? Surprisingly, it did not come from our two main characters. Beyond some teasing comments and visual baiting (Such as when the camera slowly pans upwards as if they’re going to kiss), the relationship between Ruka and Hiori is never defined as anything other than friendship. That said, the show does focus a lot on emotional bonds, platonic or otherwise, and I could possibly see a reading of them as an aro-ace couple.

The second cour was a pleasant surprise. We get introduced to a new pair of characters, who are undeniably queer. Their relationship, and their complicated feelings towards each other, end up being given a lot more space than I had expected from this series, with some of the gayest word exchanges I’ve ever heard in anime. Besides these two, we have several other characters who can easily be read as queer, and who played a huge part in me liking this anime. Also worth a mention, is that this is one of those shows where men do not seem to exist – they are neither mentioned nor shown.

All in all? I don’t regret watching Blue Reflection Ray, and found it enjoyable despite its flaws. Would I recommend it to anyone else? Perhaps not. It is very tropey – it just happens to have tropes that I’m personally fond of.

Ratings:

Art – 4 Not a fan of the art style. The animation looks cheap, and the 3D parts do not blend in well.
Story – 5 Average, nothing new or special about it. 
Characters – 7 Tropey but likable. Sweet interactions.
Yuri – 6 Thanks to a certain pair in the later half. (I’d say 3 at most for the first cour)
Service – 3 Less than your standard anime. Uta is responsible for most of it.

Overall – 6 Average but enjoyable.

Erica here again: Thanks so much for taking a look at this series for us! I started to watch it, but found the style (which I suspect is in line with the game, but felt very basic to me, like a really good high school animation project,) and the predictability of the storyline a little too thin on the ground for me. I am glad to hear that it gets better in the second cour, and maybe will just skip a bit. ^_^





El-Hazard: The Magnificent World OVA 1 + 2 Collection, Guest Review by Xan H

September 1st, 2021

Hello and welcome to Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu! I’m thrilled to welcome back Xan, with another terrific review! Settle in and give Xan your full attention, and get ready for a retro ride into anime – and our own – pasts. ^_^

I’m Xanthippe, creator of the comics Pandora’s Tale  and Thinking Too Much to Think Positively. Today I’m here to talk about the long-overdue Blu-ray release of the anime probably best remembered as Tenchi Muyo’s peculiar younger sibling, El-Hazard: The Magnificent World OVA 1 + 2 Collection.

It’s hard for me to be objective about a show that I have a lot of personal history with, and El-Hazard might just be the most personal of all. This was the first anime I loved, my first online fandom, and my introduction to Yuri. In fact, it was the first media I’d ever seen in which a gay character was just there, a part of the main cast, existing for something other than a punchline or to make a point. It might be hard to imagine these days, but in the mid-nineties, this was a revelation.

It’s also probably true that a show in which a boy has to pretend to be a missing lesbian princess with the help of said princess’s girlfriend might have held some special appeal for a closeted trans girl who was mostly attracted to women.

Some years ago, Erica reviewed the first OVA which comprises the majority of this set, and I mostly agree with what she had to say, so I’m going to try to avoid covering too much of the same ground here. But for an overview: El-Hazard was an isekai before there was such a thing as isekai. Taking cues from Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars, this is the story of three high schoolers and their teacher who are transported to a fantasy world, gaining strange powers along the way. Protagonist Makoto and teacher Mr Fujisawa are pulled into the politics of the royal family, who are quick to take advantage of Makoto’s resemblance to the missing Princess Fatora, and Fujisawa’s newly-acquired super strength. Wannabe tyrant Jinnai finds himself among a civilization of giant insects, who quickly appoint him as their commander, while his sister Nanami has the misfortune to be deposited in the middle of a desert.

I appreciate the amount of care Nozomi Entertainment put into this collection. The cover is the same one used for the most recent Japanese Blu-ray release, and I’m admittedly not a fan of the art or the bluish color palette – I feel that the sandy-colored cover of the old DVD collection better captured the feel of the show. On a brighter note, I’m happy to report that the numerous Easter eggs recorded by the dub cast for the DVD release have been preserved, and compiled into a short feature. They’re a mixed bag in terms of quality, but they prompted a few smiles, and it’s just nice to see the effort made to preserve a part of the show I feared would be lost with the change in format.

The original, seven-part OVA is easily the strongest incarnation of the series, and this remastered version looks gorgeous. The background artists took full advantage of the fantasy setting, giving us one lovingly detailed painted environment after another. This OVA, while probably not being quite long enough to do its large cast justice, manages to tell a complete story with a satisfying conclusion.

El-Hazard’s second OVA functions as more of a side story. Loosely adapted from some of the El-Hazard radio dramas, it’s half the length of its predecessor and never really reaches the same heights. The animation is noticeably rougher, and with no remastered version available, these episodes have been upscaled to HD. It’s an improvement over previous releases, but the drop in visual quality between the first and second OVAs is still quite noticeable. That’s sort of OVA 2 in a nutshell: it’s fine. If you enjoyed the first OVA enough that you’d like to spend a couple more hours in the company of these characters, this should scratch that itch.

Probably the most notable element of the second OVA, at least from this review’s perspective, is that we get a lot more of the show’s lesbian couple, the bratty Princess Fatora and her adoring consort, Alielle. There are elements of these characters that haven’t aged all that well – the archetype of “girl-crazy lesbian who doesn’t respect boundaries” is something I suspect we’re all tired of at this point – but damn it, I can’t help but love these two. At the time, I didn’t see stereotypically horny lesbians making a nuisance of themselves so much as I saw two queer women who were loudly, insistently proud of who they were. There’s a moment late in the first OVA when Fatora, who has been absent for the story thus far, asks with the most knowing smile if Alielle tried to cheat on her while she was gone, and it speaks volumes about their relationship. Fatora knows as well as the audience that Alielle has been chasing girls the whole time, and is mostly just amused at her attempt to deny it.

Another aspect of El-Hazard that still stands out today is its English dub, often cited as one of the earliest truly high quality anime dubs. Ironically, it succeeds in part because it hails from an era when dubs weren’t held to the same level of scrutiny as they are today; the dub script has plenty of little additions here and there to spice up the comedy that I suspect a modern dub wouldn’t get away with. In the original, Jinnai names his insect lackeys after characters from the sitcom Sazae-san, a reference that would be immediately familiar to Japanese viewers but lost on almost anyone else; in the dub, they’re named for the Marx Brothers. A scene in which Fatora tries and fails to impersonate Makoto has some discussion of his dialect, which doesn’t translate particularly well into English; the dub takes a different approach and delivers what I still consider one of the funniest lines ever uttered in an anime dub.

The strong script is ably delivered by a mostly excellent English cast. Especially notable is Robert Martin Klein’s Jinnai, a radically different take on the character compared to Ryotaro Okiayu’s booming tones. Meanwhile, Melissa Fahn’s performance as Alielle conveys some depth I personally feel was lacking in the original, and is altogether more believable as a royal consort, while still maintaining the original’s peppy charm. Finally, on this rewatch I was particularly impressed with Nanami, a character who feels a little underused, but is nonetheless played with great energy by Lia Sargent. It would be remiss of me not to point out one sour note with the dub, though, and that’s the use of a certain homophobic slur beginning with “d” – though thankfully not aimed at either of the show’s openly lesbian characters. The Japanese script uses no such term, so I’ve no idea what happened here, but it’s a downright weird choice in an otherwise great script. Despite this wrinkle, I still strongly recommend checking out the dub for an altogether funnier experience and what I’d consider to be the definitive versions of these characters.

As I said, I agree with much of Erica’s review of the show, so my overall ratings are similar, with a few exceptions:

Art – 8 (The remaster really lets OVA 1’s gorgeous background art shine)
Story – 8
Characters – 7
Yuri – 7 (bumping this up a point for the extra focus Fatora and Alielle receive in OVA 2. They even get to frolic adorably in a lake! Can’t say no to frolicking.)
Service – 4

Overall – 8

As a teenager, I adored this show and wanted to lose myself in its fantastical world. Then I got older, became more conscious of its flaws and backed away from it, perhaps a little embarrassed by my earlier enthusiasm. Well, now I’m even older and I can say… honestly, it really was a fun little show, and I can see why my younger self was so enthralled with it. To be sure, there are parts of it that show their age, as one might expect of a show from 1995. At the same time, the show is queer in a way that felt downright subversive for its day, and holds up far better than many of its contemporaries.





Super Cub Anime on Funimation

August 1st, 2021

Super Cub is not, in any way, not even remotely, Yuri. It is, however, a compelling, if often enraging, anime about many things, including friendship, dreams and, quite possibly PTSD.

We begin the story in a kind of emotional abyss. Koguma has no friends, no family, no money, no anything. She lives in a stark little one-room apartment, eating cheap retort food. Her life is painfully bereft of life. Why? If we watch the anime, we will never know. The originating novels do explain, and as suspected, her situation is rooted in loss.

Even without knowing specifics, can anyone think of a positive reason why a young woman would live alone, with just enough money to survive but no more, with no one to care for or about her?  It seemed instantly obvious to me, that whatever brought Koguma here, it was not a happy circumstance. From the earliest moments of the story, I could not help but see Koguma as person whose life was a result of trauma. Her lack of affect, her difficulty relating to the people around her…it all felt as if we were entering the anime with a wall blocking us from seeing the why, so we must focus on the what…I had a lot of trouble coping with the early episodes as a result of this.

In fact, this is a major complaint I have in anime (and other pop culture from Japan, like idol culture,) right now. The performative aspect of emotional trauma. I literally sobbed my way through the first episode, I was so horrified at how empty Koguma’s life was…and knowing that we were working out of that did nothing to lessen my anger that it was being used for entertainment. 

I am so done with the emotional torment of children for plot purposes in anime. It’s low-hanging fruit for emotional engagement, but holy shit I hate it a lot. Every anime punches down like that it seems and I don’t want to have to watch it all the fucking time.

That said… the story is not about how she got here, it is about how she gets out – and that made for a still-often-difficult- but-frequently-triumphant story that I could not stop watching.

At the heart of this tale is  the power of a peer group, of fandom and of friendship – all of which make this something that the Okazu audience might find worth watching. Through the course of the story, Koguma discovers love in the form of a little used scooter…her Super Cub, And we are introduced to a global fandom we might not have ever heard of! Apparently the Honda Super Cub fandom is worldwide. If I thought I could ride a scooter, I might have been tempted, as the 2021 model is, honestly, quite darling.  ^_^

Koguma’s first peer in this new fandom is the mechanic who makes it possible for her to get her Cub in the first place, and then slowly gives her gear, advice and maintenance, so she grows more confident. With every new challenge, Koguma begins to find her humanity.  When a classmate turns out to also be a Super Cub enthusiast, Koguma makes her first friend. 

Reiko is the perfect foil for Koguma. In the anime, we again are given no details of Reiko’s circumstances (which are, again, somewhat predictable based on her circumstances, and detailed in the novels.) In stark contrast to Koguma, Reiko is ebullient and clearly wholly comfortable with her life. Reiko is perfect for Koguma precisely because she doesn’t need Koguma or her approval or companionship. Reiko’s comfortable with herself and has her own goals. Because Reiko doesn’t rely on her for anything, Koguma is free, at last, to begin to move past her stunted emotional growth and become a person of her own. It is this Koguma who is at last able to make a friend in Reiko.

So Koguma now has a fandom with peers, and a friend. Slowly, her Cub allows her the mobility and freedom to become more interested in things and places. But her life is still insulated. We enter into a section of the anime in which Koguma is allowing her interest in her Cub and her friendship with Reiko to expand her horizons..but only as far as Cub-related things can stretch.

My absolute favorite part of the anime is the episodes in which Koguma and Reiko take on summer jobs. This section contains some breathtaking animation art and character development unlike anything I have seen in anime. In a conventional anime this would be when we get the details of Koguma’s tragic backstory. Instead, this anime looks always forward. Additionally, Reiko’s summer is not positioned as a foil for Koguma’s at all. Instead she gets her own time to try and fail to achieve her goal. Reiko’s desire is to ascend, while Koguma’s is more human in scale, and with her new job, she finally starts to become more comfortable with people and the comforting banality of social ritual. (This lesson took me a good 40 years to learn, so good on Koguma!) It also teaches Koguma that to be relied on, and to ask for help, are okay.

We come to a crisis in the anime at this point, and I cannot have been the only one who was on tenterhooks as Shii inserted herself into Koguma and Reiko’s cabal of two. In real-world relationships, a third person can be a real problem. Shii is, however, endlessly sincere and helpful and when the crisis arrives we are not angry at Shii at all. All the adults in the room might have been screaming “Call 119!!!!” but out of concern and frustration. Everyone I know watching this felt this way and we all remind ourselves that 1) they are teens, 2) on their own, without adults modeling responsibility and 3) it’s a fucking fiction, Erica, get over it. ^_^;

Setting the frustration at that aside, Shii’s crisis forces Koguma to do something she has never before had to to – to take care of someone who is not herself. In this, she finds a protectiveness and strength she had no idea she had in her.

Suddenly, the Super Cub bubble has been broken…and it’s okay.

The final arc of the anime was brilliant in every way possible. It ends in the only possible way I would have found acceptable. All of the themes here come together. Koguma’s insular bubble made possible by her Super Cub snaps open and she is able to expand it, to include new experiences, new responsibilities and new people. In the end, Koguma herself explains this to us. Her Super Cub gave her opportunities…but it was up to her to take them. Now it will be up to her to make new opportunities for herself and for others. And wow, if that isn’t a lesson for fandom, I don’t know what is. ^_^

Fandom gives us opportunities to enjoy new things, meet new people, have new experiences – but it is also up to us to make new opportunities for ourselves and for others to enjoy! 

For an excellent exploration of emotional intimacy among young women – with a focus on interiority, and emotional growth – Super Cub was a fantastic anime. If you haven’t watched it, I hope you will. Super Cub is streaming on Funimation.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 10
Characters – 10
Service – 4 Yeah, but it’s kind of handled goofily
Emotional Intimacy Between Girls Without Romance – 10

Overall – 9

One point off for performative trauma.

I truly enjoyed Super Cub and it is certainly in line for one of the best anime I watched so far this year, along with Zombieland Saga Revenge and Odd Taxi. It’s been a good year for anime with three such completely different, really excellent stories about being human from outsider perspectives.