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「心とことわり」 (Kokoro to Kotowari)
“Heart and Reason”
Jigokuraku is undeniably one of the biggest hits of the season. I was probably leaning towards covering it anyway, but as befits a strong season the overall quality of the bubble series is pretty high. My Home Hero and Ao no Orchestra are still on it, flawed to be sure but with enough going for them to be tough to drop. Of course I’d say very much the same about Hell’s Paradise, which is why it was in there too until now.
About this episode I’d say it was pretty disturbing on multiple levels. Rokurouta was never anything more than a killing machine (as Genji and Eizen would attest) but watching him flail about was strangely unsettling. I guess I should give credit to the seiyuu Tadokoro Hinata for what was essentially a pretty thankless job, because he managed to inject those wordless howls with a certain amount of pathos (it certainly didn’t come from the writing). I felt sorry for the creature more than anything, and that bit with Sagiri at the end rang a little hollow with me for that reason.
Yuzuriha proves no help here (and is easily the most annoying thing about the series at the moment), doing little apart from attaching Senta to a tree, and Rokurouta proves too much for even Gabimaru to handle alone. That forces Sagiri to swallow her fear and self-doubt and join him in battle, though even then the giant proves a formidable foe. Eventually Gabi has to start a fire (which proves irresistible to the local monsters) and bring him down with smoke inhalation. Again, this all had a strangely tragic tone to it.
With that, perhaps the deconstruction of the mythology can truly begin in earnest. Whether Shinsenkyou is really the domain of mystical hermits or not, the Gabimaru group stumbles upon what at least looks like a human settlement. And the Aza brothers, unseen last week, stumble upon a couple of human-looking maidens going at it pretty hard in the forest. Things are getting weirder, if anything, which isn’t such a bad thing (assuming of course it all actually leads somewhere).
Oh boy, where to start?
I feel like this show is not well-directed at all. For starters, it should have been darker in visual style, something like Death Parade/Fate Zero/91 days/etc. The current style is too bright and cheerful, it doesn’t suit the atmosphere at all.
Also, the reactions, facial expressions, body language are waaaaay over the top. The characters are paper thin, every single one of them is a cliché. The inner monologues and conversations are too on the nose. what the fuck? Everything is so blatantly forced upon us that they are practically telling you what to think and feel. There’s no fucking subtlety. The expositions are delivered badly. Not a single realistic interaction between two characters. What they say, what they do, how they act around others, their decision making, etc, nothing makes any fucking sense.
Also also, the power scale is all over the fucking place. Are those executioners supposed to be strong? How the fuck did they capture those prisoners? One moment they are useless, next moment they are the strongest thing since Saitama.
Finally, for an action show, the action sure does suck big time.
I was excited for this one because of a few manga reading friends, but now I’m curious, is the adaptation a gigantic fuck up? Or is it the same thing as the manga and it’s just not written for an adult audience?
If you don’t fuckjng like shonen just say so. Your choices in anime tells me you prefer seinen and look down on shonen. Well let ne tell you something, there are plenty of “shinen” series that are just as dark and nature as fate zero (Chainsawman). I say this adaptation was handled poorly but that doesn’t mean the source material sucks. It just that mappa has too much on its plate and it shows in this adaptation. It is why I prefer reading the manga only and skipping adaptations.
I still like shonen, provided it’s not an utter mess.
I like Boku no Hero, Jujutsu Kaisen, Kimetsu no Yaiba, etc, and even Chainsaw Man got better after a bad start. Now those aren’t as good as Vinland Saga, for example, but they are a fun time. Jigokurako just seems to have no redeeming qualities, up until now.
I had reasonably high expectations for this one.
How interesting. The writer is having Sagiri take a moderate viewpoint. This will help Sagiri reconcile her doubts and obstacles, I’m sure.
The part where Yuzuriha said she is doing her part by info gathering kind of irks me. I worked in the Culinary field as a Su-chef before switching careers. Whenever there is a BIG banquet to prep for, the response I get back from my team is, “I’m helping by stocking the shelves for you.”, “I’m helping by washing the pots and pan for you.”, grinds my gears. It’s code for I don’t want to do more manual labor work, I want to take another break, and I want to go home and play.