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Whatever choice you make, whatever path you take, live it to the fullest. The message is simple, the idea isn’t. Tatami Galaxy weaves a complicated string of narrative threads through a canvas that tells a humble story. How would you relive a moment in your life which you believe has gone down the wrong path? What if it wasn’t one moment, but a combination of moments. A cacophony of looping situations with slight differences that all lead to a split second in which you realize that you haven’t achieved your goal. That miserable moment where you realize the last two years was wasted. What do you blame it on? Do you blame it on a person? An event? A choice?
Our nameless protagonist, Watashi, which translates to “I” in Japanese meets a man at a midnight ramen stand. This man explains that he is the “god of matrimony” and he’s trying to match up two people. This brings Watashi to reflect upon his last two years which he believes have been wasted. And so, a clever twist on a groundhog loop begins. We relive the past two years of Watashi’s life every episode, and we see the different choices he could’ve taken to achieve what he calls a “rose-colored campus life”. Multiple common threads and situations tie every episode together. Similar pieces of dialogue in different contexts illuminate a whole picture for the viewer as we begin to figure out the story as our protagonist does. Every choice he makes is one that is in line with his character arc and the end the final choice that leads him to true success.
This exquisitely crafted story expertly portrays a common idea. However, if you boil down any story ever told, it can be whittled down to certain, previously used elements observed in various other, older works. There are only so many stories you can tell. So the way you want to tell them is in a way which expresses your own unique ideologies. If the story is about a finding yourself, what kind of approach do you take? Expressing yourself through your drawings, your directing, your characters. A great director can express himself through the narrative and visuals. I feel like I understand Yuasa just a little bit more after Tatami Galaxy wrapped up.
The amount of effort Tatami Galaxy put into conveying its theme is what ended up selling the story so much more. The grounded, yet surrealistic approach to the narrative as well as the visuals lined up perfectly with what you could view this dreamlike experience. Yet unlike so many anime which I’ve seen, this fantastical and surreal story is rooted in some of the most human emotion I’ve ever watched.
I want to treat this review more as just a dump of my feelings, rather than some in-depth analysis or overly-structured points. This is because I don’t think a show like this favors that. The story it tells is to be experienced and analyzing it, while mandatory, is something that you yourself, as a viewer, should do. It is that kind of narrative. One which you can siphon your own thoughts from based on your own experiences. However, it’s three-prong narrative, which explains the foreground, background, and meta nature that is accessible to every viewer. The story succeeds on three levels, which is three times more than most.
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[Style is Substance]
A common complaint I hear is that something can be too focused on a style and neglect to add this pesky thing called “substance”. Much like the various other buzzwords I’ve deconstructed over the course of my reviews, substance is yet another word which bothers me beyond belief. Not because it is wholly and unarguably subjective what substance in entertainment can be, but because it is often used as a criticism by people who can’t explain their point. If they disliked something it “lacked substance”, and if they loved it “had bountiful substance”. Yet what they never explain is what that substance means to them.
Substance, as I’ve gathered in a colloquial sense, means story, character, narrative, structure, and visuals. It means it all. More importantly, though, it means a balance of it all. If the focus is uniformly on creating an effects reel of beautifully composed shots that lack intriguing characters, then that project “lacks substance”. Personally, I believe substance is everything that is decided by the viewer. It is what you value. If that’s poorly constructed romance with overly corny dialogue and cloying emotional resonance? Then so be it. That is your substance. That is the metaphoric matter that makes up the piece of entertainment which you enjoy.
The idea that substance in any way is separate from style is preposterous. It is what makes up the project and if the director intends it to be wholly stylistic then so be it. However, when you can blend incredible style and an impressive narrative then you are creating a project that is successful on two fronts. It isn’t stylistic and full of substance; it is simply a stylistic story. Something that makes your jaw drop both visually and narratively.
Tatami utilizes a unique kind of pervasive animation where it not only blends photo-imagery with animated characters but also filters real-life video so it fits the animation. It’s an incredible blend of self-indulgent stylization and surrealistic substance. It fits the kind of illusory narrative being unraveled. There are also various smaller animated ideas utilized throughout. A few rotoscoped scenes looked particularly captivating.
The biggest boon that this astonishing visual flair adds is that it gives Yuasa the opportunity to craft scenes that speak through their visuals. Metaphoric representations of common concepts are rife in this series, specifically within the sexuality of this series. The symbolism that is shown isn’t subtle, but it doesn’t have to be. The visual style supplements the lack of subtle symbolism because the style itself is wholly abrasive. It only makes sense for the rest of the show to be that way. That isn’t to say there aren’t subtle themes and motifs, there are. Particularly in how various objects or creatures are incorporated to portray a certain character’s entire being. Whether they be love dolls, moths, or the devil himself.
Tatami Galaxy is masterfully constructed by Masaaki Yuasa, who has always been a director and creator I admired due to his unique eye for visual storytelling. How certain stylistic choices can set an atmosphere that tells a more compelling narrative than the exposited narrative. My first encounter with Yuasa was in an episode of Adventure Time which he storyboarded and directed. For those who don’t know, Adventure Time is a wonderful cartoon that airs in the west. Later on in its run it began to incorporated various guest animators in the same vein that Space Dandy did. This guest animator would come in and completely take over an episode, crafting a story with previously established characters in a completely new visual assembly. Yuasa fashioned this eleven-minute episode of Adventure Time so memorably that it is one of my favorite episodes of the entire series to this day. His art style, but specifically the way he draws was so captivating that I honestly blame him as one of the many reasons I’m so into the animated medium.
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[Characters Living in a Room with a Meta-Narrative]
The Tatami Galaxy maintains a static list of characters throughout its run time. Each one has established traits that get elaborated on as the series progresses. Your preconceived notions of these characters are challenged as every episode rounds to a close because each episode portrays them similarly, but with new background information that helps color your perception of the story. This is the kind of fractured narrative which I adore. There are only a few shows out there that utilize the idea of a fractured narrative well, and I can say that The Tatami Galaxy uses it perfectly.
Our protagonist meets this trouble-making devil-boy, Ozu, who seems to be attached to him through every timeline we see in the series. It is if the cosmic string of fate drags these characters together. Ozu plays the contrast to Watashi. He helps paint the conclusion to the narrative before the conclusion even begins. The story tells itself so well that you begin to understand with the characters, which is a marvel. The ability to express an idea with enough complexity to stay mysterious, but with enough honesty and established elements to maintain realism is not something to ignore. This is only an element of some of the best mysteries ever created.
So many lesser-mysteries often include elements that were never previously established to wrap a story up. While this isn’t necessarily a bad way to write, it is a way that ultimately doesn’t feel cathartic. These characters are attempting to unravel a mystery but unfortunately, a certain element is kept just off-sight that you can’t unravel it with them. All you can do is throw a few pot-shots at the conclusion and maybe you might get it right by sheer chance. What Tatami does is lay out a foundation and continually build on it. This foundation is shown through Watashi’s choice of clubs, each choice signifying a different route he wanted to take in that life.
Furthermore, what draws this interesting twist on the groundhog loop is that no character is fully aware that they are experiencing the same events because these events are all occurring at the same time. Much like parallel timelines, these aren’t events that happen one after the other. Watashi’s timelines all create a different character by the end, however, this different character is still dealing with similar issues that lead him to regret his life choices due to similar beliefs. This occurs to almost every character. While this story is Watashi’s, every other character has similar notions of the past and present, as in, there are lingering relations that they seem to have even though they just met each other. This conscious decision is made to keep these characters attached through a thread of fate, which is later explained as a feeling of “nostalgia” towards one another. It’s a very metaphysical way of approaching life. The idea that your relationship to someone grew through perhaps a meeting in another timeline where you met each other through different means.
That’s where the interesting structure comes to play further. While these events may be happening at the same time for the characters, they aren’t happening at the same time for the viewer. The story has a foreground narrative, a background narrative, and a meta-narrative, which all come together by the end to create one of the most satisfying and cathartic finales I’ve ever seen in television.
The reversal that’s experienced by our protagonist is one that can only be described as “thematically relate-able”. A term I reserve for moments where the character progression is both in line with the story, and in line with the way I’d logically understand our character’s motivations. Watashi’s final goal being that of a “rose-colored campus life” is, in itself, a rose-tinted thought. A thought plagued by preconceived notions of what a college experience “should” be like, rather than what you make of it. This can be drawn, in a meta way, to the idea of what a story should be. What substance should be. What you should expect from your experience with a television show. This narrative is wholly meta since the entire thing is being exposited to us by Watashi, the nameless protagonist. He speaks to us, and his ability to is never fully explained. This one-sided conversation is only supplemented by his conversation with his other conscious, his lust. This relate-able, realistic take on a choice, any choice, continues to impress with the narratives ability to keep similar moments feel interesting by injecting new facts and connecting these universes together. When the truth is revealed and the story begins to make sense, everything slowly starts falling into place. As the description of a 4.5 Tatami mat is exposited, you understand that the story is about breaking an undesirable loop and begin to understand that the life you are living is one that you ultimately cannot change. Watashi’s happiness is his own. When he wanders meaninglessly through thousands of same, yet semi-different Tatami rooms he begins to crave the life he’s lived throughout the rest of the show. That same life which he felt that he ultimately ruined.
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[Realism]
The experience is realistic. In the same sense that any story can be realistic, regardless of the setting. You can tell a high-fantasy story that has more realistic characters than a cop drama set in urban Detroit. That’s simply because a character is only likable if you can logically understand them. That understanding can either be logical or through relating to them. An often-misunderstood aspect of character writing is that you must make your characters relatable to everyone. Obviously, that’s impossible, so instead, you need to make them rational. If put into the kind of situation they are in, regardless of what it is they need to act logically to be related to. Because regardless of who they are, you can still place yourself in their shoes.
From what I’ve seen, anime has problems with this. Perhaps it is simply cultural and I’m just some westerner who doesn’t understand. However, so many anime avoids writing nuanced characters in favor of attempting to make them fully self-insert-able. Not relatable, but completely fantastical. The line between relate-able and non-relate-able is much closer than you may think. One misstep and they turn into someone that is just there to appeal to everyone, which comes off as fake, or someone there to be used as wish-fulfillment, which is also fake and obnoxious. The unfortunate thing is, this goes for so many anime. Not even just the trashy harems or the bombastic shounen, but so many anime fall in line with creating characters that aren’t real, as much as their traits are over-exaggerated to fit in line with what may sell.
This may be due to multiple reasons, either my cynicism or the kind of demographic the majority of anime is aimed at; Teenagers. Miyazaki said that it is because the otaku has become the producer, and creates products based on his own interest in the medium. He believes that since the otaku is incapable of observing humans, they reference manga or anime that relates to them and draw conclusions on how people act from that, which obviously isn’t representative of real people. This detracts from human storytelling because the way you capture a real person is not just through characterization, but through the way they speak, the imperfections that lay with how they look or how they behave.
These imperfections are paramount to create realistic characters. These imperfections are virtually non-existent in a medium where every girl needs to be colorful, sexy, and purely marketable. This completely unnatural and idolized view on someone causes these characters to be inherently unlikeable to me. They are just toys to be looked at and rated on all these stupid “best girl” lists and conversations; They are objects of affection, goalposts, non-existent and completely illogical hunks of figurative meat. This whole industry is full of that shit and it’s saddening because animation is such an expressive medium being held down by whatever is creating this putrid need to create non-challenging boring childish entertainment. Where everything sexual is played as a cliché and treated like a thirteen-year-old would treat a course on the human body. Maybe it’s just how cynical I’ve become so quickly.
Tatami isn’t that though. Tatami is completely different. Not only because it feels like one of the pieces of work completely un-reliant on the kind of marketing perpetuated in Japan. But because it is trying to tell a completely different kind of story. Instead of the eventual love-interest being some overly-cute and completely unbelievable piece of meat, she is instead her own person which, through the previously established thread of fate is bound to at least interacting with our protagonist. Now, don’t get the word “interacting” mixed in with “falling in love with.” It isn’t that kind of story.
By the end, the conclusion isn’t that they admit their love for one another after knowing each other for a little bit. It isn’t that she promises to marry him after three days of speaking. It isn’t any of that. It is simply one character asking another character out after they’ve done something nice for them. Yet this seemingly basic conclusion is infinitely more cathartic to me than all the sappy fantasy-fulfillment shlock that I’ve seen before this. For once, I felt like this character is someone I understood. In anime, that is a pretty rare experience for me.
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[Conclusion]
If I’m staying vague here, I’m sorry. I must skirt the line between overt analysis and review which I often dislike. Reviewing something is so hollow since every detail that would explain your love or hate of something needs to be obscured by double-meanings and insipid hints. I always try to balance on that threshold because that’s what this is called, a review. I inject a personal analysis because that’s more interesting. Without that, this whole process would feel as though I’m meandering and repeating the same parochial bullshit that you can read anywhere else.
What you should know is that The Tatami Galaxy is a special show. It is short, tightly constructed, and extraordinary beyond belief. Not because of its style or its “substance”, but because it blends the two to create something you don’t just see, but something you feel. You can laugh, relate, and sympathize, but you can ultimately learn about someone. As I’ve said, there are only so many stories that can be told. It is up to you to tell them in ways which someone can siphon a unique context from.
“The crossroads” is a common theme in storytelling. A moment in which you choose left or right, up or down, yes or no. The change which engulfs the rest of your own story. That is ultimately what Watashi, and no doubt the rest of us end up experiencing. A crossroad. What kind of choice you make, though, eventually becomes irrelevant because once it is made there is no way to rewind what you experience. At the end, these alternate lives that Watashi lives through are all his own lives with different choices leading to different events unfolding even past the two-year timeframe we get to observe. Yet each one has what you learn to call a moment in which you decide to live exactly how you want to.
I mentioned a “reversal” earlier on in this review. The reversal of not only two characters, but the acceptance of one idea over another. Yuasa’s belief that regardless of which choice you make you must live with it, and live you must, live happily. Regrets are something to weigh you down. The conclusion, as Watashi bursts forth and sheds the weight that has been burdening him all this time, is that simple. It is a combination of elements shown through every timeline which he’s lived in and deciding choices that he made.
The Tatami Galaxy is a masterpiece due to its ability to maintain surrealistic elements with an ultimately grounded narrative. But in a more metaphoric and esoteric way, it is a masterpiece because it tells a simple, well-used narrative in a way that conveys the feelings of one person at that time. Whether those feelings are from experience or from fantasy, they are feelings that permeate through the show and tell you what makes someone who they are. The Tatami Galaxy finishes with its opening and begins with its credits. The notion that a story is ending, but another is beginning. This show is just short enough that I can't point out a single misstep in its run-time. The biggest problem with rating television is that you have to judge every single episode. A single misstep in a show, regardless its length can sometimes be detrimental to its rating. Tatami is short though, which gives it enough room to explore its themes but not enough room to lose its story. Which is so spectacular to watch. A love story that doesn't play like a love story, but instead like a mystery. As Watashi wonderfully tells the viewer, “Nothing else is as boring to tell as a story of successful love.”
