Dr. STONE / First Impressions

「KING OF THE STONE WORLD」
“King Of The Stone World”

What good is rebuilding civilization without a little conflict?

General Impressions

Man, after a wild first episode that thrust us straight into the (literal) stone-age, I wasn’t ready for what this second episode had waiting for us. Because if I’m being honest with you, I was thinking we’d just get to see more of Taiju and Senku’s antics. Instead we were given another episode full of various layers of character development and the introduction of who I assume will be one of the biggest drivers of conflict in the story.

Starting with the lighter side of things though, I can’t get over how much I love the dynamic between Taiju and Senku. Senku is definitely someone who speaks their mind and there’s no reason why he’d have to humor Taiju especially when he’s already shown he can nudge Taiju in a specific direction. But being more than just a sarcastic genius, I love how he hasn’t cast aside his humanity (and sense of humor) and is capable of holding fun conversations. Using the very first piece of new dialogue in this week’s episode, it’s clear that Taiju had no intentions of forcing his will of wanting to revive Yuzuriha and instead was leaving the decision to Senku as the brains of the unit. As one would assume, you’d think that he’d have some sort of rhyme or reason in his choice but instead demonstrates he’s uninterested in the politics of deciding these things and was extending his appreciation to Taiju by handing the choice to him. In a one-two punch we learn more about Senku’s demeanor toward this new world as well as witness just how much he actually cares about Taiju without him explicitly stating it. That and this moment heavily plays into events later in the episode when we have to deal with Tsukasa.

The moment with the lions before reviving Tsukasa was also another great moment explaining all of this, but I think the first part sold it better since there wasn’t also an immediate threat to force either character in reverting to their instincts.

On that note, Tsukasa seems to be ridiculously overpowered. Not only is he able to take on a lion with his bare hands but his aptitude and ability to successfully hunt all sorts of game feels almost a little too unreal. That said, because it looks like he’s actually the bad guy and not a part of Team Senku, it’s not such a bad thing since it’d probably take someone ridiculous to put up a fight against the power combination of Senku and Taiju. The thing is, Tsukasa fundamentally seems like an alright person who just views the scales of justice a little bit differently. Instead of trying to return to the status quo, his idea of restarting civilization instead of reviving it doesn’t sound all that crazy when you’re starting from scratch — which leads me to believe that in the future we’ll get to see more clashing of ideals that give fights some actual substance.

Anyways, what a fantastic episode! We got to see the beginnings of the conflicts to come, learned more about our core cast of characters, and even got to learn just what “Dr. Stone” actually means! Jokes aside, I honestly can’t wait to see next week’s episode where we’ll hopefully get to see just what Senku has in mind for his fourth use of Calcium Carbonate. The show obviously wanted us to see that he’s working on a crossbow (I hope that’s a crossbow) and it sounds like the only way you’d be able to stop Tsukasa from smashing your brains out would be to incapacitate him using the power of mechanical advantage. In any case, I’ll catch you guys next week. See you then!

 

ED Sequence

ED: 「LIFE」 by Rude-α

Preview

19 Comments

  1. Here, I was kinda expecting a light hearted mild discovery-of-the-week episodic series.

    Tsukasa was sorta unexpected in that I didn’t think this series would have dark elements —
    if the series was “previewed” with a darker tone, you’d expect a character like that.
    He has already shown that he can revenge-kill (i.e., 1st degree murder), so this guy is
    pretty dangerous. But I think Senku has a plan to deal with him, and I’m anxious to see how.

    Good series, art, VAs, and story are pretty good. Looks like a keeper.

    mac65
    Reply

  2. I wish they’d been a bit more subtle with the OP. As soon as Tsukasa popped up ominously walking toward the camera with that evil red back lighting i was like “Oh…. so he’s going to be a bad guy” which totally ruined the twist at the end of the episode.

    qwert
    Reply

    1. Even without the opening, I assumed he would turn evil because if he stayed with the main duo, they would literally be unbeatable. No blind-spots in their dynamic. He would be the perfect foil to the main duo, which he turned out to be.

      Goodwill
      Reply

  3. Somehow I enjoyed this a lot more in anime form than in manga form… I kept thinking the ideas were simplistic in the manga, but when I see them again in the anime they seem concise yet thought-provoking.

    Player
    Reply

    1. wait you are on to something. what if our civilization was acutally like that and thats why we advance so much in the last 100 yr wen our planet is literally bil yrs old

      yodad
      Reply

  6. A little sledgehammer subtlety by the author: Senku and Taiju get saved from a lion attack by the Lion King (Tsukasa Shishiou – the first name actually uses the kanji for Lion King).

    Anaxim
    Reply

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