Finished Psycho-Pass (first season on Netflix). Briefly, it’s the spiritual successor to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, directed by Gen Urobuchi (Fate/Zero, Black Lagoon) and animated by Production I.G (GITS, Attack on Titan). Same format as GITS:SAC—female/male detective team in a somewhat dystopian future investigating a horrific criminal mastermind. The technology level is set slightly lower than GITS—cyborg bodies are possible but expensive, and it’s not possible to emulate a human brain yet.
The titular psycho-pass (which is a pun in Japanese for psychopath) is a metric (associated to a color scale, from white to black) measuring a person’s criminal capacity. In this future Japan, everyone’s psycho-pass is monitored extremely carefully. People whose psycho-pass becomes “clouded” by stress or mental illness eventually become latent criminals and are contained in isolation until either their psycho-pass clears or they die. Crime still happens, and the criminal justice system uses a combination of inspectors and enforcers to neutralize criminals. Enforcers are latent criminals that have chosen to work in the police force under the close watch of their inspectors. Their weapon of choice is the Dominator, a hand-held electronic pulse weapon that ranges from non-lethal stun gun to complete obliteration in proportion to the threat’s criminal coefficient (0-99 = locked; 100-299 = stun; 300+ = lethal).
The first season follows the main duo, Inspector Akane and her enforcer Kougami, as they hunt down a mysterious criminal mastermind who connects latent criminals with the technical expertise they need to commit their crimes, in lieu of committing crimes himself. Akane is a newbie, so we get the standard newbie introduction to the Sibyl system of inspectors and enforcers, and the danger an inspector faces in maintaining their mental health while investigating horrendous crimes. The pattern of tension between a high-ranking newbie with an experienced subordinate occurs multiple times. Naturally, since this is a dystopia, not everything is as it appears.
The animation is high quality, and is especially brutal at times. Both my partner and I cringed several times at some of the fight scenes because they were painful to watch. There are a few filler episodes, but most of the episodes were worth watching, and they are relatively good at avoiding most of the standard Ghost in the Shell tropes (one exception: early on they do a remake of the classic GITS:SAC episode “Chat! Chat! Chat!”). I gave it 8⁄10, that is, essentially as good (IMO) as the first season of either GITS:SAC or Fate/Zero.
The SYBIL system deciding things such as what career people would be best suited for seems to damage some people so much that they become catatonic, for no apparent reason except to make sure we know it’s bad, like Yvain described in the post about dystopias on his old blog. And that’s before we find out gur flfgrz vf cbjrerq ol gur oenvaf bs frevny xvyyref.
One minor villain is a standard “wanting to be immortal makes you evil” type of character, who notably in a tv interview that shows the public face he hides his evil side with uses a pro-transhumanism argument I’ve heard from actual transhumanist speakers. Probably the “transhumanists are secretly evil” implication was accidental, but I didn’t like it.
The main affect I had from watching the show, was that a villain was the viewpoint character during their death scene, I emphasized with them as they were made to feel helpless and then killed, and I then felt annoyed about that feeling.
For those who are tolerant of deathist and dystopian memes, and don’t share my personal weirdness, I second the recommendation.
The SYBIL system deciding things such as what career people would be best suited for seems to damage some people so much that they become catatonic, for no apparent reason except to make sure we know it’s bad
I don’t recall something like this happening. Most of the time—as far as I remember—it’s other people reacting to psycho-pass information that causes psychological damage. E.g., one character is extensively bullied because of their psycho-pass, one or two characters’ psycho-pass degrades the more they obsesses over it, etc.
One minor villain is a standard “wanting to be immortal makes you evil” type of character
I’d say he was more “evil and coincidentally also wanting to be immortal.” The only character that really disagrees with living forever is Kougami, whose expected future quality of life is relatively low.
This. My biggest issue with Psycho Pass was precisely the frevny xvyyre oenva thing. The writers created an interesting world, posed a variety of interesting questions (fubhyq lbh qrsre gb na ragvgl gung pynvzf gb xabj orggre guna lbh jung jbhyq znkvzvfr lbhe hgvyvgl, jura lbhe orfg rfgvzngr bs gur pbeerpg pbhefr jvyqyl qvfnterrf jvgu vgf bja naq vg qbrf abg rkcynva vgf ernfbavat?), made clear their opinions on the subjects (flovy vf rivy! serrqbz vf n fnperq inyhr!), but justified them with trivial accidents of the setup (frevny xvyyre oenvaf, crbcyr sbeprq vagb boivbhfyl njshy yvsr pubvprf) - those things are not a necessary aspect of the system and it is imagine to consider a less convenient world in which the writers would have had to actually engage with the issues they raise. A pity, because the series is otherwise so good.
I was honestly expecting Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun to run out of jokes an episode or two in, but actually it keeps getting better and better—shaping up to be my favourite comedy so far this year.
I’ve been surprisingly taken with Barakamon, a heartwarming slice-of-life. I was expecting a sports-anime style coverage of calligraphy, but actually it’s more reminiscent of Usagi Drop or Wolf Children.
We’ve been watching Mahouka for the laughs. It starts out fairly unassuming but rapidly becomes one of those shows that is so dire it’s actually comedy gold; the main character is the most blatant Gary Stu I have ever seen, and by ep.10 or so it is reminiscent of North Korean propaganda.
TV and Movies (Animation) Thread
Finished Psycho-Pass (first season on Netflix). Briefly, it’s the spiritual successor to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, directed by Gen Urobuchi (Fate/Zero, Black Lagoon) and animated by Production I.G (GITS, Attack on Titan). Same format as GITS:SAC—female/male detective team in a somewhat dystopian future investigating a horrific criminal mastermind. The technology level is set slightly lower than GITS—cyborg bodies are possible but expensive, and it’s not possible to emulate a human brain yet.
The titular psycho-pass (which is a pun in Japanese for psychopath) is a metric (associated to a color scale, from white to black) measuring a person’s criminal capacity. In this future Japan, everyone’s psycho-pass is monitored extremely carefully. People whose psycho-pass becomes “clouded” by stress or mental illness eventually become latent criminals and are contained in isolation until either their psycho-pass clears or they die. Crime still happens, and the criminal justice system uses a combination of inspectors and enforcers to neutralize criminals. Enforcers are latent criminals that have chosen to work in the police force under the close watch of their inspectors. Their weapon of choice is the Dominator, a hand-held electronic pulse weapon that ranges from non-lethal stun gun to complete obliteration in proportion to the threat’s criminal coefficient (0-99 = locked; 100-299 = stun; 300+ = lethal).
The first season follows the main duo, Inspector Akane and her enforcer Kougami, as they hunt down a mysterious criminal mastermind who connects latent criminals with the technical expertise they need to commit their crimes, in lieu of committing crimes himself. Akane is a newbie, so we get the standard newbie introduction to the Sibyl system of inspectors and enforcers, and the danger an inspector faces in maintaining their mental health while investigating horrendous crimes. The pattern of tension between a high-ranking newbie with an experienced subordinate occurs multiple times. Naturally, since this is a dystopia, not everything is as it appears.
The animation is high quality, and is especially brutal at times. Both my partner and I cringed several times at some of the fight scenes because they were painful to watch. There are a few filler episodes, but most of the episodes were worth watching, and they are relatively good at avoiding most of the standard Ghost in the Shell tropes (one exception: early on they do a remake of the classic GITS:SAC episode “Chat! Chat! Chat!”). I gave it 8⁄10, that is, essentially as good (IMO) as the first season of either GITS:SAC or Fate/Zero.
Issues I had with Psycho-Pass:
The SYBIL system deciding things such as what career people would be best suited for seems to damage some people so much that they become catatonic, for no apparent reason except to make sure we know it’s bad, like Yvain described in the post about dystopias on his old blog. And that’s before we find out gur flfgrz vf cbjrerq ol gur oenvaf bs frevny xvyyref.
One minor villain is a standard “wanting to be immortal makes you evil” type of character, who notably in a tv interview that shows the public face he hides his evil side with uses a pro-transhumanism argument I’ve heard from actual transhumanist speakers. Probably the “transhumanists are secretly evil” implication was accidental, but I didn’t like it.
The main affect I had from watching the show, was that a villain was the viewpoint character during their death scene, I emphasized with them as they were made to feel helpless and then killed, and I then felt annoyed about that feeling.
For those who are tolerant of deathist and dystopian memes, and don’t share my personal weirdness, I second the recommendation.
I vaguely object to calling it deathist.
I don’t recall something like this happening. Most of the time—as far as I remember—it’s other people reacting to psycho-pass information that causes psychological damage. E.g., one character is extensively bullied because of their psycho-pass, one or two characters’ psycho-pass degrades the more they obsesses over it, etc.
I’d say he was more “evil and coincidentally also wanting to be immortal.” The only character that really disagrees with living forever is Kougami, whose expected future quality of life is relatively low.
I agree, it’s not deathist. It isn’t particularly pro-immortalist either, but that doesn’t bother me.
This. My biggest issue with Psycho Pass was precisely the frevny xvyyre oenva thing. The writers created an interesting world, posed a variety of interesting questions (fubhyq lbh qrsre gb na ragvgl gung pynvzf gb xabj orggre guna lbh jung jbhyq znkvzvfr lbhe hgvyvgl, jura lbhe orfg rfgvzngr bs gur pbeerpg pbhefr jvyqyl qvfnterrf jvgu vgf bja naq vg qbrf abg rkcynva vgf ernfbavat?), made clear their opinions on the subjects (flovy vf rivy! serrqbz vf n fnperq inyhr!), but justified them with trivial accidents of the setup (frevny xvyyre oenvaf, crbcyr sbeprq vagb boivbhfyl njshy yvsr pubvprf) - those things are not a necessary aspect of the system and it is imagine to consider a less convenient world in which the writers would have had to actually engage with the issues they raise. A pity, because the series is otherwise so good.
I was honestly expecting Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun to run out of jokes an episode or two in, but actually it keeps getting better and better—shaping up to be my favourite comedy so far this year.
I’ve been surprisingly taken with Barakamon, a heartwarming slice-of-life. I was expecting a sports-anime style coverage of calligraphy, but actually it’s more reminiscent of Usagi Drop or Wolf Children.
We’ve been watching Mahouka for the laughs. It starts out fairly unassuming but rapidly becomes one of those shows that is so dire it’s actually comedy gold; the main character is the most blatant Gary Stu I have ever seen, and by ep.10 or so it is reminiscent of North Korean propaganda.
In descending order as usual:
Fuse Teppō Musume no Torimonochō (review)
Cat Shit One (review)
The SoulTaker (review)