Since I’m stalling on preparing for my job interview and I promised my THOUGHTS.
Okay like, I was totally with this show till the last two episodes…like, it wasn’t AMAZING or anything, but it did what it was doing well enough and the relationship between Scion and Rat was interesting and full of conflict.
But everything felt very rushed at the end- Scion going into a psychotic yandere emotionless rage spiral all of the sudden was very abrupt. YANDERE EYES!!! It almost became a parody of itself at a couple points. It’s not that it wasn’t foreshadowed somewhat in the show that he has weird yandere rage tendencies (APOLOGIZE TO HIM!!!), but it just felt like it was all happening too fast. I mean, I’d probably have a nervous breakdown if I had to climb a pile of dead bodies too and then saw the dude I was all into on get shot, but I felt the show could have executed it better. That’s all subjective, and maybe I wasn’t in the right mindframe at the time.
The world building of the show and basic plot didn’t come together very well. I had no idea what this angry bee goddess’s deal was (they tried to use her to kill people and she got mad and…did what they wanted? But then asked that shit be blown up? then light and songs and?) and what exactly was up with Rat’s backstory, or what was up with Scion’s mom being one of the founders. I imagine this all is explained better in the light novels, but it’s not an interesting enough premise for me to bother to read about it, esp with the lack of ladies.
I have no idea why Safu had to die, it just seemed like forcing tragedy for no reason. Why did she have to be blown up with the computer? Why did Rat not attempt at all to think of other options? I felt like I was missing something the entire conversation. Regardless, I found it pretty gross that the show engaged in the oldest cliche in the book of having a female character captured, possessed and then destroy herself for the dude she likes, though he likes another dude, but he will now feel guilt and manpain about her *tragic hopeless love and sacrifice***!!! Yeah, you don’t have to sacrifice a female character on the pyre of tragic gay love, it’s stale and it’s stupid, especially when you didn’t even bother to develop what was happening enough for it have any impact or make sense. She literally had to die so these guys may live. STEP ASIDE, LADIES.
And then the final scene, which again was really rushed and felt like forcing tragedy for the sake of tragedy. Like Scion is vaguely bummed that Safu was sacrificed on his altar, Rat kisses Scion and then he’s suddenly gone? Like whoa hey what happened where did you go, I was so confused. And then Scion is just like ~~We’ll Meet Again~~ and I’m like “WHEN DID HE LEAVE AND WHY???”
(also the novels confirm that Scion only thought of Safu as a friend, could not return her feelings on account of being gay- the anime was more vague on that for some reason. Sucks 2 b Safu)
I looked up the light novel, and yeah, it’s executed a bit more sensically there with Rat being like ***I believe in the city you will build you have work to do and I have to wait until you’re finished because of reasons I will hold you back remember Safu entrusted you with shit I’ll be back boo*** and then there’s an epilogue and he opens the window for Rat to come back. Fairly cliched but at least not CONFUSING and trailing off into nothingness like the anime did.
But hey! Gay characters with actual somewhat nuanced conflict in their relationship treated casually and respectfully, I can see why people like that and it was interesting all up until those last two eps. I give the show my blessing on those counts, but not on the ladies and plot side of things.
I found DogKeeper (Inukashi) to be a really interesting character. Kid raised by dogs, has a ridiculous army of dogs, obviously suffered a lot, dedicated to surviving above all else, anger issues, still very vulnerable and childish, often torn about what to do, pretty bamf
Have a weakness for angry children and I liked the character design.
An interesting aspect about the character was the ambiguous gender identity. In the anime, Inukashi’s pretty androgynous, but seems to present as and be referred to as male (that might have just been subs tho)- but then there’s a part where Inukashi’s upset and crying and Scion feels his shoulders while hugging him, and then with surprise goes “You’re a…”. Looking it up, in the novels and manga Scion is explicitly noting the shoulders were slender. So like, it’s left ambiguous and there’s nothing to stop me from reading Inukashi as trans, and in fact the work gives ambiguous evidence for that, so cool!
So yeah, I find the character pretty fascinating- I’d have liked to learn more about him and would totally love to watch an anime about this brat and his army of dogs. Like who abandoned him? How did he even learn to talk and socially interact? Sadly, he was just a side character so we didn’t learn much.
