Holy crap, that was absolutely fantastic and I'm now convinced that Rintaro is a genius. But I don't want to make it sound like something "deep" or try-hard "artsy" because it's not; it was just a surreal, modern-day ghost story with an ESP twist. But what made it mind-blowing is just how well executed it was. The animation, the humor, the extremely unique direction, the stylized and cartoony yet extremely organic and skillful character drawings, it was all absolutely spot on. The only minor criticism I have is that animation shortcuts started popping up in the second half, but given this is such a niche work it's amazing that they could muster so much great animation to begin work.
A lot of people say "I don't get it". Well there's nothing to get. It's the cartoon equivalent of Edgar Allen Poe short stories. See: "The Masque of the Red Death" or "MS. Found in a Bottle". The similar artistic appeal of this story should be obvious to anyone who has even a tiny bit of experience with surreal, spooky stories.
THERE'S NO NEED TO HAVE THAT SHIT EXPLAINED. The entire appeal of Poe stories, the Fuan no Tane manga (that people shit on for "not explaining enough, being too short, too random"), and Take The X Train itself. The appeal of all this stuff comes from the loose ends. IF you understood the story perfectly, there'd be nothing to be spooked about anymore.
Simple but perfect story, amazing animation, genius direction, fantastic and very skillfully drawn character design. 10/10. |
