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「ピュアジッター」 (Pyuajittā)
“Pure Jitter”
So it seems Flip Flappers is really buckling down and getting to business this week. Normally, each episode Flip Flappers is first and foremost about the new and wonderful way it’s going to visually impress us, and that’s been it’s chief strength and main draw. This week, though, we don’t even get a foray into Pure Illusion (flashbacks aside). Instead, we’re fully into what we can call the revelations arc of the story, not only for us, the audience, as we see the intrigues of the plot unwind after a season of mystery, but also for our protagonist Cocona, as she confronts a newfound truth about herself. And it is now that everything starts to come together, both figuratively and literally. The Flip Flappers and the Kreepy Krazies Klub finally meet in direct battle, and we’re invited to make some comparisons between the two. Juxtapose the Flip Flapper’s relative compassion for their enemy with a lack thereof for one’s own. Search for that link between Yayaka’s childhood and Papika(na)’s. And question whether it’s better to slink around, masked, in some secret cult or to just wear your crazy on your sleeve.
There’s a still a bit of confusion, on my part, not really with how events have been progressing (I mean, of course the grandmother was a robot sleeper agent; I’ve been trying to warn you all along!) but in how we’re supposed to view them. Cocona finally learns that basically her entire life and everything she knows is a lie and, yeah, I’d be a bit upset too if it happened to me. But how much are we connecting with our protagonist here? While Cocona has been our point-of-view and we, like her, have been kept in the dark about all sorts of things, we’re not exactly in the same boat, are we? Cocona’s not really representing our frustrations. We actually know far more than she does, and are in a way accomplices in the conspiracy against her. We certainly had cause to be suspicious of her grandma while she did not, and we were told about Yayaka’s falsities last episode. No one’s seems to really be on Cocona’s side, not even us. Flip Flappers hasn’t lied to us at least.
…Has it?
Well, even with our privileged positions, questions still abound. It’s probably a good thing that Flip Flappers is managing to string one mystery into another to keep the suspense going until the very end, but the closer we get to that end the more worried I am that we’re going to be left with that dragon, plot holes. But Flip Flappers has shown remarkable method to its madness thus far, so perhaps I just have trust issues. Still, I look forward to the day when characters in this show develop the ability to give straight answers and finish their sentences. In the meantime, I really would like to know: how old is Papika? Salt’s obviously aged (what the hell happened to this nice kid?!), but Papika seems to have always been as she is and always will be. Are you a robot? A clone? Speaking of which, if Mimi is Cocona’s mother (…or something), who’s the father? Is it the clone thing? Is it Salt? Is Mimi a spore-based organism?
Episode 10, and there’s still so much we don’t know. It’s a unique sort of excitement. Or maybe trepidation.
Preview
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I’m pretty sure that Salt is Coconas father. It has been heavily implied that he was close to Mimi. That puzzles us with the question: why is he so indifferent to her? Maybe he is not aware of it. Or I’m wrong and Cocona is an amorphous organism like the Childs and his affection for Mimi was always one-sided.
I’m also very sure that Papika and Papikana are not the same person. I guess that Papika is some kind of Papikanas clone.
If you remember back to episode 07, there was a baby involved, it looks like, and that’s probably Cocona.
Whoa, good catch. Missed that.
So following the review intro next episode Salt will be like:
or pherhaps:
References aside, I also hope for an (at least partly) original ending, since now that the NGE vibes became more accentuated and some even say that this episode could be viewed as an almost identical copy of the story of The End of Evangelion, it would be nice if the final revelations carved out an authentic path for the plot which doesn’t feel as a rip-off.
While it is in the nature of art to imitate art, to say that Flip Flappers is a ‘rip-off’ of Evangelion is a bit much, I think. Especially when Evangelion neither invented nor holds a monopoly on dead mothers and daddy issues.
Let it be clear, that what I wrote in my previous comment is more of an observation than serious criticism. I myself immensely enjoy watching Flip Flappers and since Evangelion is one of my all-time favourite shows, in my book any anime which can successfully pull off an Evangelion rip-off already deserves some praise. But as it stands now Flip Flappers just pays homage to different styles and stories, not even close to being a rip-off of any anime that have come before. I wasn’t even a bit bothered by the similarities shown in this episode, only after browsing through the reddit comment section and seeing remarks about the analogous flow of the story I realized that the majority of this episode’s events are comparable to the The End of Evangelion, which in and of itself does not inherently represent bad or good storywriting, it just lessens my epectations a bit. If the remaining three episodes follow the same route as NGE did Show Spoiler ▼
than I will have conflicted feelings about the series but I think it has a really low chance to be actually true Show Spoiler ▼
The test kids being eliminated if they fail is a plot point similar to one in the creation of a bad guy in Full Metal Alchemist manga and Brotherhood. And I’m sure earlier works.
I think papika at one point did age as we see what looks to be an older papika in the preview. Whatever tragedy that occurred removing mimi’s existence from reality must have also affected papika and in turn her memories, forcing her to regress back to her 14 year old self
Compared to Salt, who’s definitely rusted over (insert oxidation joke here), Papika’s basically Papikana, right? Maybe they’ve kept her on ice all this time and she’s only been thawed out recently.
So who was that one guy that we saw that one time in Pure Illusion?
I think that was Salt? Probably? But it’s Pure Illusion, so I guess it could have been anybody.
Surprised that there are so few comments but only part way. I did not know what to say after this so I did not comment till now.
You almost cannot create something in modern times without borrowing from something done before and that something probably borrowing from even earlier so I do not let that bother me. Game of Thrones was special in that it took the format from historical fiction and applied it to fantasy but even there I’m not sure it not the first just the first to be paid attention to. If you want to create a genre I think you got to go back to early 1800’s like when Eager Allan Poe created the detective genre and a base story set up copied by Sherlock Holmes.
I really like how they did this. Do wish this had been say 18 episodes so we could have had more simple adventures in Pure Illusion but a 24 season with 21 episodes of that might have been to much.
space dandy did it so i dont see why flip flappers couldnt have gone on for two seasons; who knows maybe there will be a sequel
Sadly, I don’t think Flip Flappers exactly lends itself well to a sequel, unless of course the plot is not resolved this season (which I don’t want either). The novelty and the mystery are very much part of its identity, and I don’t know if that can be sustained if it intends to lay out the entire plot.
Passerby, I would be rather disappointed if there were a sequel of Flip Flappers. On the other hand I would love to see another project by the same team.
I think there could still be a second season of flip flappers while wrapping up the major plot points of this season. Let’s say that pure illusion still exits by the time the series’ ends..what stops the creators from being able to make a second season built strictly to papika, cocona, and now yayaka traveling to pure illusion and having adventures. There’s a plethora of concepts and character exploration that can be had from making a second season based purely on pure illusion while bringing in some sort of overarching plot to compliment the season. I dont know; i think it’s within the realm of possibility but that would be up to the creators of the show
It only makes sense with a show that main theme is identity, the final conflict addresses the identity of Cocona. I also disagree that Cocona is dr Salt’s daughter, as the show doesn’t even hint of that possibility before. Anw how about making Iroha-chan the final boss (her arts just look like Pure Illusion worlds for one thing)? With show like flip flappers you can’t rule out anything, can you?