So where does Nobunagun, our anime of interest, fit into all this? Well, what’s the plot?
In this series the personalities and abilities of influential persons throughout history have been stored and passed down in special genes known as E-Genes. Unbeknownst to her, the young military otaku, Ogura Shio, possesses one such gene deep in her body. During a school trip to Taiwan, freakish insectoid monsters attack her and her classmates. Desperate to save them, the E-gene within her awakens revealing Oda Nobunaga who lends her his power in the form of a massive gun which she uses to eradicate the monsters.
The monsters, known as Evolutionary Invasion Objects, are being hunted and destroyed by the government agency Dogoo, which finds Ogura and recruits her into their ranks and changes her life forever.
The plot for Nobunagun is a very standard “military organization beats up the aliens with teenagers with weapons” but with a twist this time. The thing liable to turn away the wandering viewer is the strange concept of the characters using the powers of historical figures as weapons. But let’s make something clear, that concept in and of itself isn’t bad. Weird sure but not instantly bad. The key word here is ‘execution’ and if a show like this were unable to execute that premise correctly, then it would fail at drawing in the larger crowd.
Does Nobunagun fail? Well, let’s take a closer look at each aspect of this series to find out, beginning with the art style.
Nobunagun clearly wants to be experimental and do something different with its art. The series is at its best in its use of lighting, contrast and color to create atmosphere and tone. At times this series can make great use of shadow and blacks against light to add imposing form and weight to the face of a character or the hideous form of an insectoid monster. Another neat but welcome oddity is the series adding fourth-wall-breaking tags to further describe or illustrate a certain thing—for the sake of comedy mostly. Such as in the first scene we have many little letters pointing to our heroine in her bed, labeling her as a drooling and sleeping girl. So this series certainly can’t be accused of being uninventive or boring with its use of color and lighting.
Without that however, the lazy character designs and crooked, barely-passable animation would become more apparent. During tense action scenes when a tide turning moment is about to occur the series does invest a bit of budget to make it look good, but many of the other monster of the day battles throughout Nobunagun can look very stiff, jerky and worst of all lazily animated. Without the harsh color tone changes during battles to obscure it, it would be much, much worse.
Another small thing to mention which could be bad or good depending on the person watching, is the unique, Megaman-escque character designs for the battle suits in the show. They can only be described as large limbed, mechanic battle apparel with an almost sailor uniform influence. They are very silly, but a possible acquired taste to most.
The Evolutionary Invasion Objects are very insectoid or fish-like in appearance and they only really grow from small bugs to bigger bugs. They can serve their purpose as being threatening, and different groups of them find new ways to attack and make use of their powers, but their designs stick within boundaries. However, the implication that these creatures are evolving from primitive life to more complicated and powerful life forms, is a chilling thought.
Now about the characters. Nobunagun contains a pleasantly full roster of characters, not too big and not too small. Other members of the government agency Dogoo, like Ogura Shio herself, posses the genes and powers of historical figures and manifest this power via external mechanical weaponry. Some of these members include Jack the Ripper, Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, the list goes on. The manifested weapon each character wields is usually relevant to the historical person who they possess the genes of. Such as Jack the Ripper utilizing all forms of blades and knives and Galileo having telescopic vision. Some are kind of on the fence or just in the realm of relevance but the premise is very silly to begin with so accuracy isn’t really a big deal here.
Each character has their own distinct personality to bring a dash of flavor to the over all package, but at their worst most are flat, undeveloped, one note and defined largely by a single trait or cliché. Because of this, many characters are simple mouth pieces with a small quirk which sets them apart from the other mouth pieces. Such as Isaac Newton likes to kiss people and turns into a bad ass in battle and…? Galileo loves Vidoq and…?
This is also the case for Ogura Shio who is very clumsy, excitable, goofy and nerdy (especially about the military things which she enjoys), but she is not a bad person at heart. Despite a few moments of baby-step character progression and a few critical moments in battle where the spirit of Oda Nobunaga helps her kick ass, she is one of the weaker, but not weakest members of the cast because she does not change at all, no matter what she goes through. She is basically the same character she was since the beginning of the series and it can be frustrating when she’s still acting like a clumsy air head after all she’s gone through. By the end of the series, however, her small moments of development do shine through but she still has a long ways to go.
The voice actors for the show range from seasoned veterans such as Akira Ishida and Suzuki Tatsuhisa (who do a great job in their roles), to smaller named VAs who still bring voice to their character very well. Being a kind of… underground show as it is, there are, of course flat sounding voices who don’t perform well but they’re reserved for the faceless mooks dying in battle, not the main cast.
Unfortunately the worst offender in the cast is Mutou Shiori who voices the main character herself. This is Shiori’s first role in an anime, and hearing her I’d think it was her first voice acting role period. While her voice fits Ogura Shio’s character, it is very, very flat, unemotional and without tone and she doesn’t really improve throughout the show’s run. It is a very shaky first performance but the actress has potential, and does give Ogura a very normal sounding high school girl voice. Here’s hoping she improves in any future roles she may have.
The soundtrack of Nobunagun fits this series like a glove. It is diverse, different, but still within a theme. What is that theme? METAL! The wailing and chugging guitars punctuate the combat scenes in this show perfectly, and boil your blood with excitement. But the soundtrack isn’t all head banging and drum smashing. There are orchestral pieces for the emotional moments, and bouncy chiptune-escque bits for the times Ogura is fangirling over military hardware. The shining star of the soundtrack being “Stone Forest Strategy” which is only used once but is definitely a scene that you’re not going to forget any time soon. Much like the art style, but being more consistent and properly executed, it is the best and most fitting aspect of the series.
Nobunagun is a bit of a melting pot of experimental ideas in both visuals, audio and plot. Many of these things bring a distinct flavor to the show itself and which differentiates its overused core premise (monsters invading, kill them) from the millions of other anime which have done it. However these small things are not enough to save the series from its biggest handicaps which are poor writing and execution. In one word this series is goofy and plays very much like a lame monster flick. You got your guns, yer fan service, yer explosions, yer cheese. This is not a series meant to be taken seriously, and I feel as though the creators didn’t take it very seriously either. The writing is by no means good, but it’s fun if you turn your brain off for a little while.
The plot is formulaic, very monster of the day, and the means in which they defeat them always boil down to beating the monster up as much as possible. The enemies slowly get bigger over time, and occasionally they destroy them in slightly creative methods, but the formula stays the same. With a majority of the cast being static, we never feel a sense of fulfillment or progression from these mundane episodes.
While this show was never meant for main stream appeal, if you want a goofy, cheesy, and fun-stupid anime about people killing giant insects and squids with the power of historical figures. Look no further.
