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kitsunesbooks · 7 years

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Re:Creators: My Favorite Anime of Spring 2017

As a writer who happens to dabble in the realms of philosophy, often do questions arise that entertain me for hours on end. I’ve sometimes found myself asking what it would be like to see my characters face to face. I’ve wondered what they would think of me, would we get along or would they all hate me for pitting them against such harsh environments and situations? It’s funny to think about things like this because I’m sure everyday people wonder what they would do if they met their god. It’s just that in this instance, I represent the god, as prideful and cocky as that sounds. Nevertheless, it’s been my belief for awhile now that an artist is the closest thing that humanity has come to becoming gods. Through art, and especially story telling, entire worlds can come into existence. This is the kind of subject material that Re: Creators tackles.

Re: Creators is for all intents and purposes, an isekai story. Isekai being that very prevalent anime trope/sub genre of story where the main character gets trapped in a fantasy world. However, to keep things somewhat fresh, the fantasy world comes into our world, or at least a version of our world. Within Re:Creators, characters from anime, manga, and videogames somehow make their way out into the real world and engage in kickass battles and debates on metaphysics. So if you know anything about me from the articles I’ve written, then you’ve figured out that I am 100% in on this show. The action and meat of the plot is great and all but it's all the metaphysics and mechanics of this universe that keep me thoroughly entertained. The conversations that occur between “creations” and “creators” are in depth and thought provoking. In a way, this anime is some bizarre form of wish fulfillment because I am actually getting theoretical answers to my questions.

The beauty of Re:Creators is how it takes characters who, for all intents and purposes, fit into strict archetypes and then slowly bends them to conform to our world’s rules. While using archetypes as a basis for character development is nothing new to storytelling, Re:Creators more or less bends the archetypes themselves through the small tidbits of character development shown throughout the series. One of the best characters in the entire show thus far is Magical Slayer Mamika. Mamika is a magical girl from what essentially is knock off Sailor Moon. As an added bonus, her design is heavily reminiscent of Madoka from Madoka Magica, which sort of helps to further cement her development and almost poke fun at a certain trope. Mamika basically tears apart the idea that injecting some “realism” into a magical girl story is in someway nuanced. While Madoka gets credit for making it work, it has opened the floodgates for a ton of really bad, edgy magical girl stories that are honestly hot garbage. Mamika however is more based in actual reality as opposed to realism. The first instance we see of Mamika is her fight with another “creation,” Selesia. Mamika recklessly goes all out and unleashes some devastating magic on her opponent with complete disregard to her surroundings. If this were any other character in any other show, she would be written off as just an asshole or a generic “sadist” character. However, when Mamika realizes that rules of our world conflict with her own, it shocks her. She came from a children’s magical girl show. Basically a Saturday morning cartoon. There isn’t any blood in her world and morality is all black and white for the most part. It is a simplistic world with little thought put into it and Mamika’s first interaction in our world is incredibly evident of that.

That first battle Mamika experiences is what sets her character arc into motion and has pretty much made her one of the best characters in the series thus far. Her eventual turnaround was very well paced and written and I hope we get to see just as much inventive and clever writing for all of our cast members. Mamika goes through a rampant sequence of development during the more recent episodes. We see that she still clings to her sense of morals but also shows that she is even willing to go against her own friends when they are doing something wrong. Mamika wants nothing more than peace, which makes sense given her source material. However, instead of Mamika’s judgement being simple minded as it would be in any magical girl show, or the plot focusing on how depressing her situation is, we see her learn and adapt. Her sense of justice doesn’t waver and instead adapts to the morals of our own world as she fights to protect both sides. All she wants is for the fighting to stop and for no one to be killed, and when she finally makes up her mind on what side to take, her actions have that much more weight behind them. Being the type of character she is, she shows everyone kindness, even the villains of this story, especially given they don’t match the archetypes of villains in a typical kid’s show. To Mamika, the villains of Re:Creators aren’t villains at all, they are just people who want to do bad things with good intentions. I could go on and on about Mamika’s character arc, but you are more than likely better off checking out the video Mother’s Basement put out on Re:Creators. Geoff does a, MUCH, better job at analyzing these characters than I do. Nevertheless, Mamika gives you just a taste of the kind of meta story Re:Creators is and honestly it is a hot contender for anime of the season if it hits the right notes.

One thing I can talk about that hasn’t been mentioned before is yet another intriguing character. With our Military Uniform Princess taking the role of main villain it was hard to think that the show would introduce an even greater threat, but it did. Magane Chikujoin is a villain character from a series in Re:Creators world called Yoru Mado Kiroku. Judging by how she acts and behaves as well as her abilities I pegged her as coming from a straight up horror series or maybe even a battle seinen with darker and more mature themes than your typical shonen series. She has a very clever ability that protects her almost indefinitely and she is a complete liar, so much so that she get’s a kick out of it. Lying is her weapon and she uses it to devastating effect. Magane is honestly a terrifying character due to her incredible ability as well as her contrasting schoool girl attitude. She is definitely much more of a villain than the Military Uniform Princess and there some big reasons why. Her knack for telling lies has gotten her involved with every major character in the series. She has a variety of strings she can pull, and while we saw her latest machination get foiled by the heroes’ raw determination and will, it is clear that Magane is willing to say ANYTHING to get what she wants. Compared to Mamika who has undergone a dramatic shift in her archetype, Magane’s archetype has only grown more rotten. She now finds herself in a world where she can do anything she wants without having her fellow characters get in the way. Bringing her to the real world was essentially the equivalent of unchaining a feral beast. Magane is shaping up to be the series’ true villain and it shows. The events of the latest episode proved her to be much more powerful than we anticipated, and with her acknowledgement of zero restraints she becomes that much more dangerous. Magane isn’t just a simple sadistic villain, she is a self-aware villain. She is aware of the existence of her world and ours. Not only that, but the way she behaves makes the viewer think that she might be aware of the world outside the screen, because Re: Creators is still an anime. It doesn’t exist in our world outside of that medium, yet there are several moments where Magane is talking directly to the camera and it seems more like she is talking to us, the viewer. There is one scene in Episode 9 that really hammers this home where she begins talking to herself, yet she is staring straight at us. Not only that, but the things she says are inquisitive and it’s almost like she is trying to convince us, the viewers, that she told the truth, when in reality she bent it. It is that one thing that adds so much more gravity to a character like this and it is incredibly intense.

I could probably talk about this show forever, but I want to leave some of these characters as a surprise for those of you who intend to give the series a shot. This is an anime that is clearly aimed at artists. Whether you draw, animate, or just write, this series was made to be watched by you. The questions and conversations posed by Re:Creators can easily be applied to your own work, and through that it provides perspective. It makes us question the content we create. It makes us wonder just exactly how our characters would truly feel in the situations we put them in. It also makes us question the level of detail we give our worlds. There are so many minor and major details across this series that resonate with me immensely. Because of that, it has become one of favorites of this season, if not this entire year. If you are an artist, I urge you to watch this show. You will not be disappointed, and I’m sure you’ll come away from it with a renewed view on your work. Hope you enjoyed the article.

#Anime #Re:Creators #Selesia Yupitiria #Magical Slayer Mamika #Magane Chikujoin #Shota Mizushino #Altair

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