TL;DR: Psycho Pass meets Mirai Nikki before they have a child so horrible they decide to leave it at the philosophy class for freshman's to decide what religion the child will have.
[Story: 6/10 , Characters: 5/10, Art: 5/10, Sound: 4/10, Enjoyment: 3/10]
“a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads and ten horns. The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her sexual immorality. And on her forehead was written a name of mystery: “Babylon the great, mother of prostitutes and of earth’s abominations.” And I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of the martyrs of Jesus.” (Revelation 17:3–6 ESV)
Thriller anime's make it or break it point is how well it can balance the dynamic between the protagonist, the antagonist and the philosophical dilemma they both deal with to justify the decision they have made by the end. From the director that brought us, FLCL Alternative & Psycho Pass 2 (not one) comes a new thriller called Babylon where our major philosophical debate is whether people should be allowed to commit suicide, thus making it an universal law. The topic of suicide, assisted suicide, and the whole idea of the justice surrounding it is any philosophy 101's students' wet dream. We think we know what is good and what is evil but as we slowly group and become poisoned by society's corruption we learn in order to continue living we must tread on a moral grey line. Although this show had a fine premise and a mystery element surrounding this core theme of suicide with a good protagonist and a very vibrant antagonist, by the end it expanded too much to quickly for it to become the next great Psycho Pass of a show. Fortunately, it did generate ton of controversy, and where there is controversy, there is popularity. So let's discuss why this dark horse of a show had the potential but just like Icarus, it flew too close to the sun of philosophy and burned down to the ashes. Let the fun begin.
With a clever title like Babylon, you immediately start thinking of two things, the great kingdom of Babylon or the whore of Babylon (if you know about the Biblical story). For those who don't know, the Whore of Babylon is the spirit of seductive culture, actively engaged in the deception and destruction of God’s people. Now without getting into the religious fundamentals, the story's central theme is basically justifying what is good and what is evil. Should people be allowed to commit suicide or is it a crime to in general. How do we judge what is good and how do we judge what is evil. Various philosophical issues come to play and this theme is portrayed through the conflict between Zen Seizaki (Prosecutor aka Batman) and Ai Magase (Whore of Babylon aka Joker). If you understand the reference of Batman & Joker dynamic akin to the Dark Knight movie, you'll understand better of how the plot is played out without spoiling too much. Essentially the issue arises in a small town of Shiniki, where this young Mayoral candidate Itsuki, proposes that suicide becomes legal. He explains his reasonings and he has Ai Magase carry out the "suicides" of the people in the city. For the first arc the show becomes this cat and mouse game of capturing Ai Magase and finding more about her before she "kills off" Zen's team via the method of suicide. It's brutal, thrilling and a nail biter to see who can out wit the other. They even introduced a drug early on, Nyux drug, that people can take to die in peace instead of the usual jumping off or cutting oneself or hanging method. In a nutshell, they were humanizing the process to be more ethical to today's standards. Sadly, in the second arc of the story, the suicide law went from a city policy to a universal policy, expanding to countries like Canada, France, Germany, Italy, UK to even USA. We get to see now political leaders of the country getting in on the debate. Oddly this also coincides with when the show went on a long hiatus before returning and it seemed people smoked too much because the whole tone of the show changed. It became too philosophical for its own good and less chaotic battle of wits where the characters were playing 4D chess to outwit one another. It definitely lost its charm and the show ended on an open ending for viewers to decide and talk about to learn more.
With a philosophical show as such, it's not actions or "plot" that attracts the audience, it’s the characters that offer the charm, particularly the villain. In Ai Magase, we see a diluted villain akin to Shogo Makashima of the past. She has this mystical aura with the whole Whore of Babylon biblical allusion as well as the Nine Tails folklore in Japan. She has the power to verbally mindfuck someone to submission to the point of them wanting to commit suicide without actually physically murdering them. On the other hand we have Zen Seizaki, this super moral good guy to the level of Superman and as the show progress we see how he slowly loses his sanity to maintain his core fundamentals so he doesn't become the very evil person he puts behind in jail. This Batman vs Joker dynamic is the central conflict in this entire show. Now to foil these characters and flesh out the good vs evil character grid, we have side characters like Detective Kujin, Prosecutor Sekuro, Mayor Itsuki, even the president of the US all the Americans hope to have, Alexander Wood, and many more. As the show progress, we see these characters give their output on where they stand on the issue and what we need to do as society. Once again, very open ended and lacking the mangaka's clear feeling towards this situation.
Looking at the technical aspects, this is one of those shows that doesn't need Studio Ufotable level animation, nor does it Studio Bones level music to make the show pop. It's a thought provoking anime and key people were the seiyuus voicing the characters. The seiyuu of Ai Magase and Zen Seizaki does a phenomenal job conveying the raw emotions and the quirks they have plus more. The OST is alright, nothing too crazy and animation is passable. A few freeze panes here and there but they cleaned it up near the end. Not too shabby overall. The OP and ED songs or rather medleys are alright. Nothing too great. Nothing too memorable.
Nevertheless, Babylon is an okay anime at the end of the day. It definitely had a great premise as a mystery thriller where we had to catch the "Whore of Babylon" before she corrupted God's people and led them to their deaths but it deviated in the second arc to this philosophy 101 bullshit about what is good, what is evil, what is justice and what it means to commit suicide. Not once did they just grow a pair and address the major issue of there is a cult leader, let's arrest the cult leader before they convert more to commit a mass murder. Nope, they were too good to do such a thing and as a result only our naïve boy, Seizaki suffers. It sort of mirrors the political climate of Japan in today's society where due to their naivety is currently suffering and in a population decline due to their ignorance of core issues early on when the problems were surfacing. So I guess kudos to the mangaka to mirror that. If the anime was stretched to a two cour anime, maybe it would've been far better since people would actually have a proper debate and not one or two lines to debate a serious matter as such. Regardless, viewers who like anime like Psycho Pass or Monster or Parasyte, should give this anime a watch. It's not going to be as good as those anime but atleast it will tickle your philosophical bone for a few hours. I'd never rewatch this anime and I hope there is an OVA to wrap up the loose ends. Anyways, thank you for reading this review & feel free to share with me your favourite quote from the anime. Ciao.
P.S. Thank you for reading. I hope you found this short and supaishi review helpful!
P.P.S. If you got through it all, do answer me this on my profile the following questions:
1) What makes suicide a crime but euthanasia not a crime?
2) Will letting suicide being a universal law solve the issue for organ donation?
3) If suicide becomes an universal law, how can one punish someone to prevent from population committing mass suicide?
