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storywriting · 4 years

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Anemone, An Enemy, Anemone, An Enemy Anemone, Anne, Nemo, and Another Me

[ So.......Anemone huh? Here’s some loose thoughts after a first viewing, including my takes of H1-Evo #1 and how my opinion has evolved now that this film is in the mix. I’ve seen it through with the JP audio exactly one time and I do wonder if my opinion on this film will change at all on a second viewing or when I get around to the dub. It’s less about plot details and more about review and general discussion type stuff, doesn’t delve heavy into theorizing just yet. That’s a trip for a different post. Cut because long as fuck even though literally nobody asked. ]

Hi Evolution #1, starring our main man Renton “Only a Miniscule Few Braincells Above Himbo” Thurston, hit me in weird ways which I think is true for most everybody I’ve seen talking about it. Part of my problem with it honestly was that I came into things with the misconception that Hi-Evolution would be a reboot of sorts. A somewhat faithful retelling of the original story with new insight into things we didn’t get to see much of. I don’t know why this is the impression I had other than screencaps and stuff, but if you only watch the first Hi Evo movie you definitely could continue to think that once it’s over. When I thought it would be an encapsulation of the original series, I had intended to use the film to introduce @himbologythestudyofhimbo to the story. She has long known it to be one one of my most favorite anime franchises and I thought a film would be a good way to gauge whether she might find it interesting enough to hit 50 episodes with me.

Ha. Haha. That didn’t work.

I hadn’t seen Hi-Evo when I was like “hey wanna watch this?” so that’s my own fault. I had seen screenshots and thought it looked gorgeous, but that was about it. I was imagining something akin to the Berserk trilogy of movies, mostly faithful to the original story with some new tidbits of information thrown in for old fans.

And again, you could be forgiven for seeing the first Hi-Evo movie and still thinking that’s what you’re in for. It is mostly compliant to the original canon and the parts that aren’t compliant are pretty wishy washy about saying so. Unfortunately what I found out really quickly is that that it’s not at all a good entry point for new fans, and that really disappointed me. I’ve been hoping for years for something to get more young blood in this fandom, BUT ANYWAY--

The whole play forward/play back thing really hinders the flow of the film, as much as I understand the point of it, especially with the Anemone film for more context. Skipping around the timeline harms new viewers in particular. It’s challenging to understand the timeline and flow of events because everything is presented out of order and without context. Sure, the first Hi-Evolution covers a ton of major story beats surrounding Renton’s personal development, but the non-chronological presentation coupled with the utter lack of lead up to key moments from the original series robs this movie of carrying any emotional weight. Who is Renton? What’s the deal with him and wheelchair girl? Are these people his parents or not? Why do we care about this Eureka girl who has been on screen in Renton’s presence for a cumulative 30 seconds. Wait a minute what’s this ship? Where did he leave from again? I thought he had a home and parents? Who are these people and why do I care?

Put bluntly this movie sucks if you can’t answer these questions going in, and even if you can you may feel a bit cheated by it. As much as I feel the need to talk about how the film is inaccessible for new fans, these films clearly are not for new fans. They function to remind you of events of the original story and then play off of those events with the new content. Even as an established fan, Hi-Evo #1 feels very watered down on its own, but it’s not on its own anymore is it? So let’s finally talk about Anemone.

What becomes clear about these movies is that they are not divided by chronology, but by character. The first movie was about Renton which is why we saw so so little of everybody else even when that robbed the story of needed context and worked to the story’s detriment. I’m telling myself the reason titular character Eureka was not on screen demonstrating her relationship to the world and to Renton despite it most likely being a central element is because they shoved her scenes into Hi-Evolution 3: Eureka, which will not be released for another year or so.

I do feel a bit more forgiving toward these movies now that I understand the format they’re going for, but I think most of my previous criticisms still stand despite that. The character focused presentation may be a deliberate creative decision, but that doesn’t make it an ideal storytelling mechanism. THAT SAID, while a character centric format really harms well developed characters like Renton, it does loads and loads of good for a character like Anemone whose screen time was always hindered by her role as accessory to Renton and Eureka’s story. We don’t get that constant stream of unfiltered perspective from her or really any secondary character, so it’s very interesting to see the world filtered purely through her eyes. I honestly found myself significantly more interested in all the new Anemone content than I ever could have been over watered-down, abbreviated rehashing of Renton’s character arc. I’m much more excited for the last film than I was with just the context of the first Hi-Evolution movie.

Speaking of which, very early on in the Anemone film, the viewer is clued into the fact that this is most certainly AU content, something that was less clear about the first movie. Eureka Seven as a franchise has really been in the 24/7 AU zone for like 10 years, which I think is cool but I also find a little disappointing. I like AU content well enough, but I also think they had a rich world already in the original series and I feel like there are a few more rich veins to explore further in the original world without necessarily needing to wrap it up in a convoluted alternate universe. Not to say I’m against like the AU stuff or anything, I’m okay with it existing, I just want a little more variety in the stuff that’s coming out. Keep up with the AU stuff if you guys wanna but I wouldn’t say no to more backstory and lore, you know? If they’re gonna pander to old fans instead of attracting new ones, they may as well hit me where it hurts. But I digress. Hi Evolution#2: Anemone’s AUness is pretty central to the story it wants to tell, so it has my full attention there.

Alternate universe characterization is something I’ve had both complaints and praise for in the past, and I’m happy to say that in the case of Anemone I have mostly praise. It’s nice to get a glimpse of an Anemone who isn’t like....as unhinged as her original incarnation. She’s well adjusted comparably, which makes her a decently reliable narrator. While she loses some of the edge that people are drawn to about her, she maintains most of the underlying personality traits you would expect of even the earliest incarnation of Anemone. This is an Anemone who had the opportunity to be socialized. You can relate to her and appreciate her feelings more easily than the Anemone viewers are most familiar with. This is an Anemone with hardships, but she hasn’t been pushed to the same extremes as her PoP counterpart. Likely due to the pretty direct narration and background, there’s also a lot more substance to her than PFoR Anemone in my opinion. It’s not really a chore to like her and take interest in her. She feels very natural in most instances. She’s a real breath of fresh air for fans who love Anemone and wanted to see her living with a healthier mindset and some better outcomes. Good on you, Anemone. Four for you, Anemone.

Most of the other characters--Dominic, the scientists, background people, Anemone’s father, new crew members, etc--are all about what you’d expect from either their previous incarnations or the archetypes they’re filling. None of the new characters or secondary characters are particularly developed, but I don’t really consider that a huge fault of it. I wouldn’t expect a 2 hour movie to meander the way a 50 episode anime can, but in times like this when I am with very few developed characters, I am forcefully reminded of what an asset and a strength the original’s depth and breadth of character writing is.

And then there’s Eureka. I expect her to be polarizing in the reviews, assuming at least some people didn’t straight up hate her in it. Everybody may have just hated it, idk.

As I said earlier alternate universe characterization is something I’ve had both complaints and praise for in the past, often both at the same time. What often comes about is characterization that I don’t necessarily like, but because the character has lived a different life I can’t really say that characterization is wrong. I feel that pull in this film quite a bit. Wrathful Eureka is boring to me. Conceptually, it just is. But does that make it bad?

Man, idk, I guess not. I didn’t like it, but I’ll defend it to a degree. In the original story Eureka was born into violence and conditioned to perpetuate violence early in life. The original Eureka Seven has a dense messaging about propaganda and information and the ways in which society conditions people of all kinds. Eureka is a docile character in the original but more and more as we learn about her, we realize that this tendency toward gentleness isn’t just a cutesy character trait of hers. It’s a choice that she’s making on a daily basis, even when more forceful options would be easier or make more sense to her. It’s a choice that has come about from a collection of experiences. Eureka becomes pacifistic because she develops her own ideals about the world. She comes to conclusions about what things make her a good or bad person and she makes the decision to be the person she wants to be. There’s weight to it. That’s something that always really drawn me to her as a character. It’s very easy to blow up in the face of something horrible. It’s much harder to keep a cool head and exercise mercy. I just don’t find the Eureka of this world all that compelling.

That said, I don’t necessarily think this read of her is wrong or even impossible. In fact, I think if this read had 50 episodes of development and justification behind it, I might even come to appreciate it. Certainly if anything could drive her to this, it would be losing Renton, so it’s not exactly out of left field for the character given the circumstances she’s in. I feel somewhat similarly about PFoR Eureka. Only somewhat. Eureka in general is a character who would probably be much more in touch with her anger if she had been raised any other way than she was. Even in the original series Eureka has a passive aggressive streak. She’s probably very fortunate that more productive methods of expressing her feelings were accessible to her before any natural tendency toward aggression was. Angrier more volatile reads of Eureka aren’t wrong or even uninteresting necessarily, but to me a lot of her charm is wrapped up in the reasons she works so hard not to be that type of character.

I also think that subversion and role reversal can be an interesting in AU stuff, so I don’t really fault them for using it here. In contrast to our typical unhinged Anemone, Eureka gets to be the one teetering on the edge so that Anemone can shine and show a little more humanity than she typically gets to. I think that’s honestly okay. I want to see Anemone have her day to be the hero. That’s something I’m okay with sacrificing a little of my preferred characterization for. I see a lot of value in a portrayal that allowed Eureka and Anemone to bond and more directly learn together. I think a lot of fans, myself included, wonder about a reality where Eureka and Anemone could have been sources of support for one another rather than pitted against one another.

That isn’t to say that I’m automatically okay with chopping up the writing in arbitrary ways, though. The thing about the reversals and subversions in Hi-Evo #2 is that they’re consistent. Compare to something like Pocketful of Rainbows and you’ll see what I mean. In that movie Renton, for some unclear reason, is the one who can understand Nirvash even though that writing decision doesn’t really serve the story in any meaningful way because Eureka is still the one who isn’t human and still is wanted by the military for....being whatever unclear thing she is in that film. Renton is no longer childish and is in fact the patient one in the story while Eureka is the one with a stubborn attitude and defined temper. Renton is made out to be more of a coward so that he has something to grow from, except for all the many many times he isn’t cowardly pretty much immediately, and the only flimsy defense of this concept that is that he was afraid of adults with guns when he was a literal child. Meanwhile, Eureka in this film is a much more brash character than we’re used to. Unlike Original Eureka, this one doesn’t want to be led or take orders anymore. She’s a loose canon who takes matters into her own hands except for all the times she cries for Renton to save her both before and after she’s teetering on her own Independence Event Horizon. There are a lot of creative decisions in that film that just plain don’t make sense to me because the writing doesn’t commit to them at all and tends to flounder around between them. I could barely make it through that film because I felt like it was contradicting itself every 5 minutes. It feels less like a new exploration of old characters and more like a bunch of ideas the writing team couldn’t agree on and slapped together anyway. If it wasn’t unclear, I don’t like Pocketful of Rainbows very much.

By contrast, any subversions or reversals in Hi-Evolution 2 fell earned enough. The writing choices are for the most part played straight and well justified. The choices are interesting. Unlike literally anything about the lore of Pocketful of Rainbows, I want to know more about Hi-Evolution. I want to understand what Anemone’s mission is and about Silver Box. I want to know why Dewey is so different from the Dewey I know. As much as I complained about Eureka’s characterization, the portrayal is decently justified by the writing. Eureka believes she killed Renton and seems to be privy to other realities where she turned out much happier. She has good enough reasons to be bitter in this iteration.

This film has honestly made me way more forgiving of Hi-Evo #1 and given me a lot of reason to take interest in what the last film might be. I’m going to reserve any big overarching judgement until that comes out in 6000 years, but I’m getting the sense that it might be New Order adjacent, in that Renton and Eureka will have to find one another and possibly revisit places that will be nostalgic for fans.I wouldn’t complain if this becomes the flagship verse wherein Eureka and Anemone form a meaningful friendship because they’ve been denied that opportunity in basically every other telling that exists so far.

Also big thank god the last film will be hand drawn because, I hate to be that guy but the GC looked like shitgarbage. I’ve become very forgiving of CG and Mocap recently but I just really disliked it in this film. Animation is a medium I know a lot about, I know compositing is a tricky job, I respect the work put into it, but...oof. I do wonder if that was a stylistic choice or more of an “oh shit the budget is disappearing” choice.

My final word on Eureka Seven Hi Evolution #2 is that....I didn’t hate it. I didn’t love it either but I had a nice enough time watching it. I’m realizing I’m having trouble landing in one particular spot on Hi Evolution #2 because I expect the next film will effect how I judge this one in the same way that this film has affected how I judged the first one. If you’re an Eureka Seven fan who is on the fence about the Hi-Evolution trilogy, I’d say give it a watch. You’ll still love your favorite characters even if they’re a little different than you’d hoped. If you’re still feeling iffy maybe wait a year until the last one comes out and binge them all at once. I suspect the experience might be improved that way. Definitely don’t go in expecting the story you already know, though. Doing that set me up for failure here.

Honorable mention for the fansubber who kept translating 勘 as very rude words describing the penis for some reason? That really enhanced my experience.

#;Eureka Seven Commentary #long post #please tumblr mobile load the cut don't hurt these people #∘⡊ ☾ ˚⊹To Be Continued⊹ — 「 OOC 」#;Hi Evolution Commentary #Hi Evolution Spoilers

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