Written by Amahara, illustrated by Cool-kyou Shinja (of which this is the 3rd work of 3 featured in this season, damn this author is rekting the Summer season hard) and produced by MAPPA. Announced as one of many shows at the MAPPA Stage 10th Anniversary event under debut director Seimei Kidokoro's direction, Idaten tells the story of humans and demons co-existing in a fictionous world where demons drive mankind nuts, only to have literate gods in the form of deities called "Idatens" for humans to pray for salvation and extinction upon their kind, and attain peace for an exchange. And damn is Idaten-tachi such an uncanny, other-worldly anime, if not already hinted by both Amahara and Cool-kyou Shinja's expressions of interest at weird-looking demon and deities with the same aforementioned traits from the series they've worked on, much less all the fast-paced frenetic action. Combine that with MAPPA's production that animation-wise, looks identical to Jujutsu Kaisen and the visuals full of psychedelia, Idaten is grotesque, rapey, and in all ways condescending, but to stomach all those, and you'll see an experimentation show like no other (well, count Dorohedoro one as well).
A deity, or an Idaten in this matter, is made out of these things: Adding your own thoughts to a nascent existence in order to shorten the amount of time required for manifestation. As a result, the personality of one who draws the newly chosen Idaten has a certain level of degree of influence shapen from the summoner. If you couldn't get that scientific-level explanation, just remember this trait: a common shared desire between beings thirsting for abilities that would help defend those worth living a life. That story is told through Rin, a young 800-year old Idaten who has witnessed the battle between Idatens and demons, and sealing them on a vast desert statue/monument-like location so that the peacetime "treaty" can be maintained for years and generations. Protecting this seal for 800 years has the Idaten gods rendered tiredness at their job, because their role is to eradicate demons, and since there're no demons to kill, they need to kill time somehow to remain for that one purposeful day, where demons have an uprising to prove their usefulness towards mankind once again. But as Magneto of X-Men once said: "Peace Was Never An Option", and indeed, demons acted on that thanks to a nation known as the Zoble Empire, stacked full of demons at their disposal to wreak havoc at both mankind and the Idaten gods they pray to. So, it's the conquest of the Idatens to finally have their purpose-driven life be served to give the demons a beating-down and wash, rinse, repeat the same commitment held for those 800 years of peace past. It's quite the simple "as molasses" story, but Cool-kyou Shinja's illustrations truly take the manga (and now the anime) to the next level.
It's of no doubt that Amahara knows what his characters want to be, and is thoroughly exemplified through the manga and anime. Starting off with the Idaten deities crew, Rin is the 800-year old Master Shifu Idaten who has crossed her life at doing the one sole, important job of not letting demons have their way, and she is OP by default, learning from the experiences of the elder gods who went before her. Her understudies are Prontea and Hayato. The former is a mix of both strength and intelligence, while the latter is this normal-looking boy who's quite brash and proud, and is one who've suffered most with Rin's unrelenting training sparring sessions, becoming the usual "no-reason" Shonen-ish trope of a strong OP character to protect those who can't defend for themselves. Paula is the same as Hayato, though she's forced to become like him because she is an Idaten in name only, and walks alongside Hayato in companionship. Ysley is truly balls-to-the-wall intelligent, I'd reckon that I can refer to him as their world's Albert Einstein. Alas, where there lies a yin, there must be a yang, and the demons equalize the Idatens in every regard. There is no shortage of powerful demons, but intelligent ones are far and few in-between, so for the lead group led by Dr. Oobami (better knows as Demon Lord Over-M for a disguise), the higher-up demons are posed to follow his political totalitarianism and make that ideology work. Some demons like Takeshita and Brandy (king and queen of the Zoble Empire) take that into heart, while others like the sex-crazed Miku envelopes that and comes up with strategists Zhuge Liang style to see their objective towards the end. Miku is a crazy-ass archetypal character (like the rest), and given Amahara's fascination for fictional rough sexual favours, I have to admit that Miku is the closest resemblance to Interspecies Reviewers in almost every way, and "come one, cum all" if we all have a lil' bit of Miku in our lives.
Not surprisingly, MAPPA has come under the spotlight recently for the unapologetic practices of overwork, and if the Attack on Titan's director Yuichirou Hayashi's now-infamous panda black eyes meme at the MAPPA Stage 10th Anniversary event is of no consolation, then the studio itself is in deep trouble of angering fans the wrong way. Speaking of the event, this show was one of many works featured at the event (with the biggest highlight of course all given to Chainsaw Man), and the reception was decent. Even then, I feel that MAPPA has been pushing their employees way too much by pumping out lots of works (just like all other studios except KyoAni), and while Idaten's production values are on the high-end, you can't really tell the backbones of how this anime managed to shine with its outlandishly unique visual aesthetics, hiding the inherent flaws of a studio whom has regularly pumped out hit after hit action-heavy shows like Jujutsu Kaisen.
The music is just simply *chef's kiss* fantastic, and by the way, it's not Akari Nanawo's ED, but Tatsuya Kitani's OP, which is just pure banger, and one of the stand-out OPs of the season. The OP visuals are on a whole other level resembling the likes of Dorohedoro, only if it wasn't CG and a lot more color to bring that trippy, seizure feel. I'd never get tired of watching such a creative OP done very well to complement the high beats of Tatsuya Kitani's excellent vocal range, and for a female-like soprano no less sung by a male. Visuals are top marks across the board, and Akari Nanawo's ED is fine I guess.
Heion Sedai no Idaten-tachi is pure uncensored wildness like Interspecies Reviewers, has character designs like Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid (when it comes to the busty boobs part), and debut director Seimei Kidokiro's first outing is truly a great step in the right direction. Definitely looking forward to more works that this director will helm in the future, and for the rest, Idaten is not for the faint of heart with its R17+ rating of violence, profanity and sexuality at the core of it all. I'm speechless that MAPPA has done another wonderful job, but that should come as of no surprise. Just get the inner workings sorted out and let everyone have some rest from working hard to give us more anime. Meanwhile, watch Idaten, it's a very good godly show that doesn't know peace in it.
