Zetsuen no Tempest

Jan 20, 2016

TheLlama

Recommended

Can you blame an anime for having too much... anime in it?

Perhaps not, but Zetsuen no Tempest tried its dardnest to convince me of it. I do not by that mean that it has a sickening over-abundance of weathered shonen tropes, overt fanservice, cringeworthy harem setups and moe everywhere you look - it has some of these things to moderate extents, but not enough that it feels bad. Nor is it the fact that that quotes and references classical literature are a dime a dozen; a feature all too familiar with those who enjoy more philosophical and ponderous animes (and perhaps fiction in general), and ... one which does work within certain frameworks and in moderate amounts, but usually, as ends up the case with Tempest, winds up as a contrived and counter-productive attempt at appearing edgy and smart, leaving the overarching work with a bitter taste of pseudo-intellectuality.

No, in fact, Tempest surprised me by having a series of opening episodes that actually pulled me in and left me intrigued, by playing out the setup in a very fascinating manner, leaving little breathing room as you gradually get a sense of a bleak situation that leaves the necessary blanks, aided by animation and music that sets up just the right tone - something Bones has a fairly decent track record with. Indeed as the plot unfolds and unravels to the viewer, we are treated to a handful of very nice twists; some are expected but none the less engaging whilst others come as a bit of a surprise, one that makes sense in hindsight, as any good twist should. The characters as introduced appear multi-layered and there's a lot that's said by nothing being said in terms of interaction and emotion.

And then... it all sort of fizzles out, not after fifteen episodes or half the series but alrady seven-eight or so episodes in it had become clear which direction it was headed, and it was not a particularly good one; I was wondering every time I was about to open the next episode. I kept hoping it didn't lose the tempo and the mood it had created - certainly, any mysterious fog about characters and the plot is bound to unravel, but it can be done elegantly or bluntly, done well or done poorly, and in some ways it did manage to keep going and hold strong to what it did well, what set it apart (and in a good sense at that) but more and more it departed and became more.... well, anime-like.

To be specific, then, as I already excluded what I meant by this statement, let me elaborate on what I include in this statement.

First, let it be said: Zetsuen no Tempest is a story about people, who range from the completely ordinary to born with a special destiny, each is faced with carrying the fate of the world on their back to some extent or another, but choose instead to disregard this in favour of acting entirely on their own, personal reasons. People who choose revenge or love over saving the world, or finding meaning in a loved one's death. It is a very interesting angle to start with, as we are usually treated to people who without hesitation tend to accept that they must, indeed, save the world above their personal priorities. To a certain extent, the characters of Zetsuen do this, particularly as time goes on and they learn to cope with their circumstances and come to terms with reality, but they remain personally - emotionally - motivated, which serves a different angle, as indeed many people would not readily say "OK, I'll save the world" when presented with such a daunting task, at least not without secondary motivation.

On the other hand, these personal and deeply emotional motivations often find themselves stranded in a vacuum. They are is repeatedly portrayed with an illogical sort of unreasonableness; not just one that can be waved away with basis in the fact that emotions are by nature unreasonable. Rather, it approaches a level of nonsensicality that extends quite beyond the scope of the human condition, it becomes a rather wishy-washy and forced excuse for the characters acting on their own impulses and not caring about saving the world (even though they deep down do), again suffering from the sort of assumed edginess that endless quotes of Shakespearian works are symptomatic of. It is the sort of unreasonableness that is often seen in anime characters as their initial defining characteristics, such as acting only for love or revenge, are taken far beyond their logical conclusion, indeed, even past the often extreme points that revenge can take one - or rather than talking about moving past it ends up becoming something entirely different of a sort, still portrayed as a desire for revenge or love but stooped to a put-on and uncohesive mess that falls on its own rambling, particularly as we are treated to a set of increasingly strained exchanges towards the climax of the first act. It loses aim and purpose in a sense; that is, the plot still knows its direction but the characters and themes feel lost in some sort of hollow vacuum manufactured separate from the narrative, in order to defend their increasingly contrived stances. And, yet, in a twist of irony, it also completely forgoes these stances at times when the story deems it convenient, oft bereft of any explanation.

After this, the second arc ends up being, for the most part, an increasing anticlimax where any sort of pull the story originally had becomes lost, washed away in favour of increasingly, well, anime-esque elements. As the heroine, Hakaze, asks herself in a moment of authorial self-deprecation: "Is this some sort of romantic comedy?" Unfortunately, making a joke at your own expense does not excuse shoddy work. It is not just the "rom-com" aspects as much as how everyone starts to act more towards anime stereotypes, the standards are more conformed to, scenes and themes and indeed even jokes alternating between the self-regurgitating nonsense, as previously described, and increasingly common anime tropes. It at once manages to depart from that which in a good way set it apart in faovur of the mundane, and also completely soil those more unique aspects, turning it on its head to something that kind of just leaves a bad aftertaste.

So, to re-ask my original question: Can it be blamed for too much an anime, for conforming to its own medium? My gut answers no, and I don't really, but unfortunately it showed a lot of excellent ways to stand apart from the rest early on, only to have that descend into utter banality and near-parodic mirroring of its once-great aspects. And I will not forgive it for introducing butt-monkey character Hanemura, who ironically ends up being almost the most relatable of the bunch at a time when the rest have long since departed any sense of reason or insight. Even so, the late introduction out of nowhere, while perhaps expected of a second arc, does not work in his favour and he feels way too weak and irrelevant a character to have the role that he has thrust upon him.

And, yet, it still offers up the occasional well-placed dialogue or development, even as it goes on, and Yoshino remains an interesting character almost entirely throughout, as one who actually offers some semblance of realism in his approach to situations and particularly his emotional development is interesting to watch. The flashbacks with him and Aika are also highly enjoyable, though Aika is the main "beneficiary" of the frequent Shakespeare references, putting her on the put-on edginess pedestal. It should be said that the parallels to characters and themes from the relevant works of Shakespeare do sometimes work heavily in the show's favour, but mostly it falls flat and you are left wondering why it even matters. Mahiro on the other hand is an incredibly dull character, the "cool guy" stereotype with an added flavour of revenge to make a very overused form of anti-hero

In the end, Zetsuen no Tempest is an anime that tries, that really tries, to do something good and different, and it almost succeeds but seems to stumble in its own feed as it gets going, which is such a shame, for it started out well. The one highly praisable thing is the soundtrack, and at times the animation, which helps set the mood it needs, but that, too, often fails its job. Most of the second half of the first arc could easily have been condensed into perhaps two episodes, and most of the second arc could have been cut entirely, or condensed equivalently, which would have lent the series the pacing and tempo it would have needed to maintain that excellent mood it sets right off the bat but quickly departs from as it descends into all-too-familiar territory.

Zetsuen no Tempest

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