Juushinki Pandora

I've always had a soft spot for shows where some nerdy guy suddenly becomes an action hero. So once again here I am, writing a review for a show that I really liked and almost nobody watched.

Story - This is a show about a genius scientist and his pals fighting monsters and bad guys with crazy science powers. However, there is also a plot that is actually pretty interesting, and it does sort of manage to work in the backstories and motivations of our 3 main heroes: Leon, Quinny, and Doug.

Art - I think the most memorable quality of the art is how colorful it ... is. I personally thought it looked fine, but I could see someone calling it overkill. The animation is pretty decent for the most part, although I noticed a few problems towards the end.

Sound - The soundtrack is serviceable with a few noteworthy songs thrown in during important scenes.

Character - In this 26 episode show, every character is given some time for development, and I found them all to be likable. I could see someone making an argument for how Chloe was underused in the plot. But she's cute, so who really cares? I sure don't.

Enjoyment - I feel like the best way to describe this show would simply be "fun". It can get serious at times, but it never forgets to give its audience a good time. I'm not sure if I'd watch it again, but I certainly enjoyed tuning in for it every week.

I'm a bit of an oddity when it comes to watching anime. I judge a show based on how well it immerses me into it's world and how deep the story is. When I watched this, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story was fairly deep and wasn't very predictable like other animes I've watched. The art style was interesting and well executed, with the 'quantum' effects really hitting right how it should. The sound, while not particularly special, was used to further emphasize the emotional impact of scenes and the mystery of the quantum realms. The characters were a little typecast at times, but despite ... their personalities being a bit trope-y, it never felt forced.

The main thing is that this is a slow-burner story, not some long adrenaline high like most mecha animes. Theres more time spent on creating the world and telling the story than mech-versus-kaiju fights, which makes the fights hit a little bit harder. It's pacing is slow and methodical, but that isn't a bad thing.

If you go into this expecting action and excitement in excess, you will be disappointed. However, if you go into this with a goal to experience a story deeper than "we have mechs and there are monsters to kill", you might find yourself enjoying this a lot more.

Going a little deeper, the lore explaining the quantum mechanical 'magic' that goes on in this story resonates surprisingly well with actual quantum theory, although handwaved a fair bit to make it more digestable for the common audience.

The only real complaint I have is the way they ended the story; it was a bit abrupt and felt like it was forced into a direction different than the story was heading up to that point. It still closed everything up nice and neat, but it felt a little bit like a deus ex machina. The ending dinged my score of the story a little bit, I would have scored it an 8 for story otherwise.

If you like an intellectual story that forces you to think a little bit instead of vegetating on the couch (or wherever you watch anime), then you would probably like this.

You know, this is an EVA clone.

But while Evangelion is christian, we can say this anime is the Atheist Evangelion, since they use evolutionary theory, chaos theory and string theory instead of bible and catholic lore to tell almost the same story, with almost the same structure, but with a nicer ending.

Juushinki Pandora can be pretty bad and boring sometimes, but its concept overall is very entertaining and kept me until the end.

Also, the characters are cool and interesting and I like the world-building. The sniper's subplot is amazing.

I'm only upset this could be prettier. The animation sucks. Like, it really sucks. Overall, ... the technical aspects of it are pretty lame. And the fanservice is dumb as fuck.

Neon Evolution EvangeTransformers...Shoji Kawamori you kinda went crazy with this one...

Juushinki Pandora gives us something of an Attack on Titan "last of humanity" while monsters named B.R.A.I (or animals that evolved into mechs) invaded the land due to the Cambrian Explosion and needing Hyperdrived vehicles named M.O.E.V in order to defeat them, but for LA's main reason as to why this anime interested LA......Nao Touyama was in it.

So to brass tax, Juushinki Pandora somewhat excels in character and story integration which makes the increasingly crazy plot twists apply and oddly enough given enough leeway and hinting as such, where the anime does falter however comes ... in in terms of structure, pacing and execution, but that a bit later.

Character-wise due to the major development and screentime with the core cast, we go in-depth with the Pandora Team and world building through Neo Xianglong and the Hyperdrives due to the link the main protagonist Leon Lau as well. Leon Lau voiced by Tomoaki Maeno is the typical nerd, absent minded yet a genius but was dubbed "the man who destroyed the world", as he joins the Neo Xianglong Pandora Team, he opens up to the core cast and less aloof to not only protect everyone but is something of a hybrid of system controller AND frontliner in the fight against the B.R.A.I. World building-wise, Leon and his rival villain brings us many of the finer detail to the newly evolved world, the Hyperdrives and really how he's linked into all this. Nonetheless being the main protagonist and being the narrative focus...this was a given and nonetheless a good narrative focus character who just like the audience is trying to figure out the craziness alongside him. Chloe Lau voiced by Nao Touyama is Leon's "little sister" and really is for the majority of the anime and is the pillar of support, there is a bit of screentime to her, only because she's something of a satellite character but only has one plot point that isn't really in focus. Queenie You voiced by Kana Hanazawa is the tsundere of the core cast but loves "cute things" and as such, she connects with Chloe really easily, she's also a kung fu artist and it incorporates into her M.O.E.V and she's after someone who killed her master and is her main focus in terms of subplots. She actually became LA's favourite character...yeah it took a bit (as in past half way through the anime as well as her character focused arc) but yeah...LA picked Kosaki instead of Chitoge this time. Next is Doug Horvat voiced by Kenjirou Tsuda a sniper and has something of a tragic backstory with a "former lover", he's the brooding nonchalant "womanizer" of the team. For supporting cast, we have Cain Hasan voiced by Unshou Ishizuka the gentle giant papa of the group who's looking for his family after the Cambrian Explosion. Next is Cecil Sue voiced by Ai Kayano, the leader of Neo Xianglong and.......Ms. Fanservice of the entire anime (no seriously), nonetheless she has a stake in this as one of the major villains has MAJOR beef with her and her clan. Jay Yun voiced by Yuuichirou Umehara is Cecil's secretary and he also has a connection with Leon in his past but it's not a major plot point. Glenn Din voiced by Yuuma Uchida is the "normal guy" of the group and he's ONLY known to be the hot-blooded abrasive and highly protective character with his only annoying running gag of "I'm not a delinquent, It's CAPTAIN".

The cast do have good chemistry only because the anime seemed to thread the characters with "family", whether it be Leon and Chloe's situation, Queenie's revenge against her personal villain for killing her "family", Doug and his "former lover", Glenn's desire to protect Neo Xianglong and Cecil's clan traditions that created Neo Xianglong that caused a mess later on with her major villain. All the core cast have a villain that opposes the themes of the core cast of "family" have and makes us get used to the characters as well as the character chemistry as the core cast have something of a core goal, protect one of the last bastions of humanity, Neo Xianglong.

As for the villains, well to say that they don't die easily is an understatement as they mostly fuel the protagonists development as well as world building as to what even the B.R.A.I's are and what the Cambrian Explosion came to be, with one of the major villains that has a link with Leon. To say ALL the villains are hamfisted or delightfully snarky is an understatement but nonetheless, the villains were a nice constrast to the rest of the core cast and the obvious shaking up of the plot and their theming of evolution or just their own selfish self-destructive interests that is in direct contrast to the protagonist's "family" theming and how they dealt with it, you know as a sorta yin and yang.

The world building is just as solid as it's characters, as LA aforementioned with Leon as the majority of the plotlines with it's characters as well as the smaller details towards many of the concepts of the anime is explained, yes quantum this and that but this works effectively well with it's plot twists...the MAJORITY of it at least. Not only that but we do get in-depth to Neo Xianglong, the B.R.A.I, the M.O.E.V, the entire Cambrian Explosion being explained, how all this affects the characters and villains motives. Juushinki Pandora doesn't handwave things away as ludicrous as it becomes as the hints were there, it's just more or less if you can suspend your disbelief with the craziness and for LA, 98% of the time it worked for LA.

In terms of animation, done by Satelight, well the animation was for the most part, consistent, with some good character designs, almost exotic especially from Queenie and Cecil. The CGI use was decent as well, blatant especially with the B.R.A.I but LA thinks that was the point of them being unearthly yet alien-like but heck even the Transforming M.O.E.V CGI use was decent, yes even the battles using the CGI was great especially with Queenie's M.O.E.V and her kung fu robot moves. Backgrounding is mostly barren wasteland but we do get some psychedelic moments that counters all this. Yes the animation does reuse ALOT of scenes mainly from the M.O.E.V transformations but really this is kinda the thing LA knows from Satelight, gorgeous animation and it's sometimes crazy battles and even OST Power Up *cough* Symphogear

And on speaking of which, the voice cast..well we have ALOT of well known voice actors, from Kana Hanazawa, Nao Touyama, Tomoaki maeno, Ai Kayano, Mamiko Noto, Asami Seto, Unshou Ishizuka, Yuuma Uchida and Akira Ishida. Really LA isn't complaining in the slightest with this voice cast, they did great in their respective roles.

So, Juushinki Pandora does have it's flaws as much as LA does praise it, as such the multiple plot threads and how exceedingly proceeds what with it's character plot threads, makes the structure sometimes hard to follow, as it either focuses on a character, a major event, or an isolated incident that latter ties into something bigger and because of that, if you can suspend your disbelief to how batshit insane it gets, but Juushinki Pandora still has some validity thanks to it's solid development of it's characters and world building, another words, there a certain method to the madness. BUT as much as most of it's plot twists does makes sense, one does not for LA and that lies in Doug's plotline especially near the finale, LA won't spoil but thanks for the elongating his plotline a bit too long that just reinforces almost blunt-force like of his backstory, but that was just LA. The only other flaw is the overuse of running gags, yes it's for "character", but for annoyance, not really, this is especially the case with Glenn and his "I'm not delinquent, It's CAPTAIN" schtick, yes Chloe has something similar but Glenn has this almost every appearance he gets.

The ending takes the logical conclusion of Leon's major villain into focus and yes the buildup to all of it and the villain "had it all according to plan" was something of a double edged sword but it was still decently concluded to say the least, cliche with the entire "nakama"...or in this case "family" surpasses the darkness but LA will give it leeway as it concluded "decently"...ALMOST half-assed.

Juushinki Pandora...was "decent", yes as much as it gets REALLY crazy, the anime does have a solid ground what wiht it's solid characters and world building, good to almost great animation and a great voice cast. yes the anime does go bonkers crazy but even then, with the foundation it gave itself and with the 26 episode length, the anime planned itself quite well to the point the craziness and plot twists becomes a given. Yeah, it's an Evangelion/Attack on Titan clone but Shoji Kawamori put in enough effort with it's characters and world building in which LA can really forgive it's much more crazier elements. Schrödinger's Cat and Pandora's Box.....it's either a evolving cat or a dead one

Shoji Kawamori....Juushinki Pandora is an evolving cat...a decently evolved cat.