When we first found Release the Spyce, we expected it to be a cute, lighthearted series about strong anime girls fighting evil forces, like Precure and Sailor Moon. For the first five episodes, everything seemed fine, and we thought RTS was actually a great anime.
But then, episode 6 happened.
Episode 6 was where everything was turned on its head, as the seemingly lighthearted series turned into sexist fanservice.
Episode 6 revealed the backstory of two of the anime girls, Hatsume and Theresia. It is revealed that in their childhood, the anime girls were kidnapped, abused, and held for ransom by random thugs who aren’t even major villains. Hatsume and Theresia were only children, and they couldn’t fight back against the thugs beating them.
The thugs received the ransom from kidnapping Hatsume, and they sold Theresia to the criminal organization. Repeat: they SOLD them. The thugs even got away unpunished, even though they abused young anime girls.
We just witnessed torture porn. Even High Guardian Spice never became this bad.
We tried to watch episode seven, but they made Hatsume and Theresia’s strained relationship a major plot point. We knew that even if the two anime girls were to make up, that wouldn’t stop the fact that their lives were ruined by sexist karma houdini thugs we only ever see in a flashback, and are likely still running rampant, harming more anime girls.
Disappointing, because it could have been a good anime, if the creators didn’t have a sick interest in fanservice and torturing anime girls.
