Anyway, the plot tells us a story of a not-quite-robot-not-quite-human named Casshern who mopes his way through the wastelands of a planet where once a mighty robot civilization now falling prey to Ruin has flourished, or so we’re told, at least, but I somehow doubt the civilization had been that advanced. We only get to see a handful of small towns, one (one!) spare parts factory, a church, and the rest is, well, desert, copious amounts of flower fields (I swear, there are more flower fields than there are towns, but of course there are, everyone knows flowers are essential to robot well-being, right?), desert, lake, plains, sea, some more desert, caves, some gigantic microphone-shaped constructions of unknown origin and purpose protruding from the sand in the, oh, did I mention there’s deserts? No, there’s no roads or any infrastructure whatsoever, except maybe, uh, some pools or hot springs or whatever, which again, everybody know robots can’t live without, like flowers. Oh, and there’s a hidden experimental laboratory tucked away somewhere, too, but it’s the humans’, not the robots’.
Yes, there’s apparently humans, too, although you only ever see, like three of them over the course of the entire series and they’re all minor background characters. They have created robots, and the apparent root cause of all conflict in the series – Luna, an, uh, immortal frog-faced girl with twin blue ponytails that provided life eternal for man and robot alike, until Casshern came along and somehow managed to do her in despite her stated immunity to death, thereby attaining immortality himself and unleashing the mysterious plague called Ruin upon the world. What it does, as we’re told and shown, is that it makes robots rust and start to break down gradually, resulting in their eventual death and dissolution into dust. All tools are apparently subject to this too, for some reason. In episode two we’re told that replacing rusted parts doesn’t work, but it doesn’t preclude robots from still trying to do that in a bid to save their life. Just, y’know, not in a rational way of “mass-producing spare parts so we could change them as soon as they start showing signs of wear” (the only factory we see is in perfect working order, so it’s certainly not out of realm of possibilities). Instead, those who can, choose to hunt smaller and weaker robots to take them apart for their innards. As in, in one instance, a large, classic box-shaped giant robot with a flail or a morning star for an arm picks up a tiny robot identical to a human child in all respects, cackling triumphantly, and gleefully tells us he’s going to get so many good parts from this body still relatively untainted by Ruin. Are you fucking dumb, Robot-Man?! There’s no way ANY of her parts will fit you.
And that was a major source of my unending frustration with this anime – NOTHING adds up. The world is an entirely illogical mishmash of half-baked apocalypse-themed ideas no one ever bothered to think through. The details of it end up contradicting each other ultimately, and that’s where the details are given at all. I have mentioned above that humans are a part of the world in Casshern Sins, but nothing is ever explained about them, not their relationship with robots after they have created them (we only know that the robot king hated them, and that “bad” robot goons will kill them on sight, but the why of it is left out), not where they reside and what they are doing now, not how the Ruin affects them, if it at all does (seems to imply it does, fails to explain how), nor, most importantly, what the difference between the robots and people even is, despite this seemingly being a plot point.
Robots in Cassern Sins behave exactly like people would. They fall in love, the feel anger, joy, sadness, despair, they cry (one character remarks to the other with disdain “You’re crying?! Like a human?!” only to do that herself a few episodes later), they dream of becoming famous singers, they bleed, they can go for a swim, they sleep and rest, they breathe, they take pills, they have families, baby robots grow up into adult robots and grow old… About the only thing they haven’t explicitly shown them doing is eating, but neither do we get a sense of what energy source if not food keeps them functioning. No sockets or landlines, no batteries, no tanking stations, no solar panels… Why bother making most of the characters robots at all, if their being robots doesn’t add anything to the story? They could’ve just as well been humans that have attained near-eternal life through advanced medical technology (as the humans in Casshern Sins apparently have!) and not a single thing would have changed.
Because the world falls apart (literally, too, har-har), the motivation and the backstories of everyone involved crumble to dust right with it. Recurring characters are static and one-dimensional, and minor characters all blend together to form two blurry blobs: the bad guys that have to hurt others just because they happen to see them, cue our protagonist flying in to save the day and utterly destroying them in a bland fighting scene without any real stakes, and the, er, I suppose, good guys, that are trying to live to the fullest despite the world around them having gone to shit, or something. Just, the ways they do it are often absurd – there’s a guy who paints the whole town bluish white, even the tallest buildings somehow, despite him being in a wheelchair and needing help to go up a flight of stairs, a woman that tries to knock out a robot who’s just passing by and strikes her fancy with aroma candles to try and make him a part of a bell (don’t even ask), a girl who likes to beat others up and fight, but somehow she’s admirable unlike the bad guys because, I guess, she looks pretty and asks before she goes impaling robots on her sword? The only decent episodic character was the human from episode three, at least he brought some much-needed levity and exposition into the dreary mess Casshern Sins calls its plot. Just as well that he died very promptly.
The main character oozes angst like Ikari Shinji on steroids. From episode one it’s obvious that none of what’s happening is really his fault, but still he spends all of his screen time (and most of viewers’ time along with it)being emo about it. His preferred method of conversation is staring at people dumbly, moaning about his suffering and repeating the last few words his conversation partner said in a questioning tone. There’s also a robot dog, the only one we see in the series, whose relevance to the story is a mystery shrouded in an enigma, but it’s there in almost every episode anyway. Then there’s a girl who starts out hating Casshern’s guts and wanting to exact revenge on him, and then ends up falling in love with him out of the blue over the course of two bizarre episodes dedicated solely to the topic. No, they’re not about their interactions – their interactions are minimal at that point. It’s a peek inside her “inner world”, and boy is it weird as heck! You could say that this is the character with most development, but since all that development is shat into existence out of nothing, it doesn’t really count. Or maybe her falling in love with the protagonist was inevitable – because this could’ve just as well been a harem with how many women fawn over Casshern, cling to him and call him beautiful. Just because. Also, we have an annoying child, whose primary function is to a) laugh like an idiot, pluck flowers and marvel at how pretty things are so that we know how innocent and beautiful her heart is and b) run away and get lost. At one point, she also serves to get the gang’s hands on an important gimmick that turns out to be a MacGuffin, forgotten about in the very next episode and ultimately serving nothing. Oh, and there’s also her guardian and apparently, gasp, the creator of Casshern (which is never explored at all), whose sole purpose is to rant about how precious the robot girl in question is to him and drive a truck around to take her places. Places where she can stumble upon Casshern, so we can listen to how she repeats his name over and over and watch her gift him seashells or something. The antagonists are similarly one-note: Mr. “I-need-to-kick-Casshern’s-ass-with-my-two-feet-because-he-humuliated-me” and Ms. “Maleficent-who-wants-to-get-knocked-up”. I won’t even touch upon Braiking Boss and Luna, because that fail is of truly epic proportions.
Many here praise Casshern Sins for its visuals and sound. I won’t deny it, the crisp lines and stark, bright contrasting colors make this series easy on the eye, and the animation is fluid and dynamic. There is of course this weird fetish that the art director has with drops of water, flower fields and pieces of robots affected by Ruin chipping off and scattering into dust, and while it admittedly looks great, it’s repetitive to the point of obsession. It smack of an attempt to appear deep and meaningful through visual means without anything of substance backing it up. The black-and-white video footage insert in one episode is another example of that visual pretentiousness. Also, I, and this is due my personal taste, absolutely loathe the character design. It’s so overwhelmingly 70’s? 80’s? There’s very little variety in facial features – we have ugly classical “bucket of bolts” robots, humanoid-type robots with distinct half-oval eyes and single vertical line on their faces, and Casshern-style sleek and pretty robots indistinguishable from, say, humans. The only exceptions to the rule would be Ringo’s guardian Ohji, Braiking Boss and maybe that short dude from the church in episode two. Casshern, Dio and Leda’s design with their regenerating bodysuits and Gundam-esque horns made me giggle. Especially Casshern with the blatantly Superman-like “C” on his chest. Also, the trio seems to have a pair of weapons hanging from their hips purely for decoration as Leda is the only one to actually use them. Why do the rest bother with them again? And Luna… well, she just looks as if someone stuck a frog’s head in a blue wig and a bicycle helmet on a loli body.
As for the music, honestly, it made me laugh at the most inappropriate moments. Sometimes, the characters would talk, and then this incredible sappy melody would start blasting full-force, and instead of moving me to tears the scene would make me gag because of its blatant grab for my heartstrings. I’m familiar with Kaoru Wada’s work through anime like 3x3 Eyes and InuYasha, and the similarities between those OSTs and Casshern’s are striking to the point of the man plagiarizing his own work. I swear there was this one track that was a dead-on ripoff of his own Sango’s Theme for InuYasha. Where that sort of music worked for a simplistic and a bit naïve shonen anime, it fails to deliver in a postapocalyptic series with philosophical aspirations. It sounds pretty, sure, but it’s completely at odds with the world and the story it tries to convey. It doesn’t add to it, it detracts from it. The voice acting is unimpressive, particularly in the leads. I suppose that Casshern’s VA does an adequate job of conveying what a sad little boy the protagonist is, but he also manages to make him sound like he’s got a developmental disorder, and his “howls of pure agony”, groans and grunts sounded very unnatural. Lyuze’s VA made her character have all the emotional range of a toaster oven. Ringo sounded whiny, bratty and annoying, good job picturing a child, I guess? The rest were passable. I’d say Braiking Boss’ and Luna’s VAs hit the mark with their acting, but that didn’t save their characters from poor writing, unfortunately.
I’ve seen reviews claiming that all lore omissions, plotholes and worldbuilding problems are actually non-issues because this anime is not supposed to be a consistent, fleshed out sci-fi story, but more of a philosophical\psychological exploration of sorts, particularly of the issues pertaining to death and life in the face of immortality and unavoidable doom. I don’t know where people saw depth, or metaphors, or anything like that, because the series is about as subtle as Casshern’s fist in a random robot’s chest. Already in episode one (or was it episode two? they do blend together so) the main message of Casshern Sins is established – “there is no true life without death, precisely because of the prospect of perishing one must strive to live as full a life as possible”. Roll credits, I guess, because all that follows is a disjointed series of mind-numbingly repetitive vignettes that serve to illustrate this particular point with plots so similar they seem cloned. There’s also an overarching plotline that comes to the forefront in the latter half of the series, but it doesn’t bring any satisfying answers about the world or the characters, and the message stays exactly the same. I swear, this could’ve been one or two-episode OVA and it would’ve been sufficient to tell this story, if you wring it out to rid it of endless landscape shots, intense face close-ups, characters standing or walking in silence and meandering pointless dialogue that doesn’t shy away from repeating the exact same phrases several times in a row in the exact same wording.
Bottom line: Casshern Sins is a hollow, artificial, pretentious attempt at making a puddle look like an ocean. If you’re 13, like the idea of robots and have never happened to ponder your own mortality, give this a whirl, and maybe you’ll like it despite its agonizingly slow pacing. Also worth a try if you like to poke fun at logical fallacies, plotholes and poorly written dialogue. For the rest, it would be an exercise in frustration.
