Category Archives: April 2022

Apocalypse Zero Sense

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The Horror… The Horror…
by Bolt Vanderhuge

This OVA is something of an oddity, and not just in a FLCL/Dead Leaves, “WTF is going on here?” sense (though there is no shortage of that). I’m honestly not sure whether Apocalypse Zero is supposed to be taken seriously or not. It’s like someone took elements of both Fist of the North Star and Neon Genesis Evangelion and mashed them together, but didn’t really care all that much about little details like plot structure.

What, you thought the fact there was an apocalypse meant you wouldn’t have to go to school?

The story follows a Gary Stu named Kakugo Hagakure, who poses as a transfer student so he can protect students and other innocent civilians living in the ruins of Tokyo. He wears the “Zero Armor” that gives this OVA and the manga it’s based on its name, which is a living exoskeleton made from the souls of deceased warriors. His main foe is actually his older brother, Harara Hagakure. They were both given armor by their father, but while Kakugo is able to keep the damned souls powering his armor in check, Harara isn’t, and turns evil, and also into a woman for some reason that’s never really explained all that well. Harara also turned into an environmentalist, which is why s/he has vowed to finish what the unexplained apocalypse started by wiping out all of humanity with his/her army of mutants and demons. Of course, in spite of having an entire army at his/her disposal, s/he insists on sending them one at a time. Worked for Rita Repulsa, right?

That being said, this OVA is a great example of weird old anime that is just so damn entertaining to watch. It is filled to the brim with graphic violence which includes things like a monster that is a literal man-eater, who will grab random guys off the streets and kill any woman who happens to be with him by squeezing them until their insides squirt out like toothpaste out of a tube.

It’s what’s on the inside that counts.

It also doesn’t shy away from gratuitous nudity, which is just as likely to be fan dis-service, like the six-breasted bear seen in the opening of the OVA, or really the majority of the monsters sent after Kukugo and his classmates. Most are dressed in very little, and one of them even uses his dick as his main weapon.

The weird visual design only adds to the oddness of this anime, and with the complete lack of story and plot structure it is very riffable. It is one of the most absurd animes I’ve watched, and it manages to keep just on the right side of funny while it indulges in its own stupidity. I would still recommend this anime, though, as long as you understand the dark weirdness you’re getting into. This is the kind of thing you watch with friends to get drunk and make fun of together.

Fuck Yeah! Check it Out!

Apocalypse Zero (2 episode OVA)
Based on the manga by Takayuki Yamaguchi
Animated by Ashi Productions and AIC
Produced by Big West Advertising, Victor Entertainment, and Tomy

Quiet Death, or Blaze of Glory?

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Yasuke has it all, just not all together. Not unlike its title character.
by Bob Johnson

Here’s a show that came out exactly nine days too late last year: Yasuke. I do not know what chemical blend fuelled the production of this technicolor blur, but my friend has this desperate need to get some of it.

Livestreamed from the editing room.

Since there’s very little I can say about Yasuke that hasn’t been said more rudely elsewhere, let’s just start with the positives: This is a beautifully animated show with a killer soundtrack. We’re talking tunes that make you forget how direly anime needs another Nujabes — Flying Lotus could very well rise to the call. Lakeith Stanfield nails the VA for the title role. And well, I can’t really remember the last time I managed to hear about anime on NPR – maybe the FuniCrunch merger made the business section – but they talked up some Yasuke for sure. So Netflix indeed put some weight behind this and marketed the shit out of it, this is not one of the obscure, back-burner titles.

But the plot? It is… hot garbage. It barely budges from the through line of the standard sword-and-damsel plot, plus or minus certain squiggly arrows doodled on the storyboard, all hastily drawn around boxes with fresh Xs drawn through them. This is so palpable I’m trying to spit out the taste of red Sharpie. There’s so much that seems to occur “in between” episodes, almost as if entire extra episodes were meant to have taken place in the meantime. I’d call it Gonzo Ending, but the whole show is this way.

Out of everyone available, I mostly blame Netflix: its famously immutable budgets were unlikely to have covered a full 10 or 12 episodes once the bills started rolling in from MAPPA to draw up LeSean Thomas’ vision. The rest of this show, however epic it was to be, found itself on the cutting room floor.

So, legitimate question: if you were in the same bind, would you decide to go with dull, cheap animation to tell your whole story – or would you turn every knob up to 11, break them off, and spam “robots versus katanas” until your cash ran out?

As odd as it may seem to say, this show’s incompleteness may make it uniquely suited as a “gateway anime” – something to get the new anime viewer hungry for more substantial shows. Anime may be more popular than ever, but there are still plenty of folks out there who don’t fully grasp the capabilities of the medium. One look at Yasuke will cure anyone of that.

Word is that more of this show is coming. I don’t think that, at this late stage, it would make any sense to try to fill it in, as tempting as it may be to complete “missing” episodes. My vote would be for a prequel, as Yasuke’s personal history remains shrouded in mystery.

I would mostly recommend Yasuke for people who are less familiar with anime and want something that can, in about three hours, introduce them to a wide range of anime tropes. And if you like watching anime for the background noise, this is a must-hear.

Maybe look it up:
Yasuke (6 episode anime)
Story by LeSean Thomas and Flying Lotus
Produced by MAPPA, Distributed by Netflix