Welcome to Ergastulum
What They Say:
In the crooked city of Ergastulum, “Handymen” Nick and Worick are the guys to call on for dealing with trouble. During one of their jobs, they get mixed up with a prostitute named Alex, who’s pimp is next on their target list. However little do they know that their fates are about to become intertwined…
The Review:
Content (warning as portions of this review may contain spoilers):
I first encountered this series around the time when Viz first started putting out the manga in the U.S. and after checking out the first volume of it I ended up getting pretty hooked. So needless to say I was pretty excited when the anime adaption was announced, and especially since it’s the kind of series that would lend itself pretty well to one. Is said adaptation worthwhile though? The answer is pretty much a yes.
This first episode follows the escapades of two “Handymen” named Nicholas and Worick who work the streets of Ergastulum city, dealing with trouble and helping out the locals. On one of their jobs their asked to deal with a guy named Barry who’s starting to muscle in on the territory of the city’s underworld bigwigs and end up getting involved with a prostitute of his named Alex, who’s constantly abused under his thumb. When it comes time to take on the job though, the two wipe out Barry’s whole operation but can’t bring themselves to kill Alex and instead take her under their wing of a secretary of sorts.
Right away the series gives of a gritty western action vibe, similar to Black Lagoon, although where Black Lagoon is more of an over the top Hollywood action flick, this series leans more towards Hollywood noir in terms of tone. The opening here leans a bit more towards setting up the atmosphere of the series than any kind of major characterization but it makes for a solid start regardless as it’s pretty easy to get wrapped into the setting of this kind of show and the leads come off as a really cool pair. What characterization we do get though, is mostly delegated towards Alex’s struggles and ultimately getting out of them, which while pretty straightforward in execution, still works fairly well.
There’s also just enough tidbits beyond the basic setup to keep things somewhat fresh. Nicholas being deaf is an interesting spin for a protagonist and while I was worried about how the show would handle that, it does a pretty good job of handling it by limiting him to actual sign language as opposed to just having his voice actor make the signs and then speak anyway. In fact it works so well that the one instance where he does speak in the episode is simultaneously effective and frightening (so much so that his voice actor, Kenjiro Tsuda practically sounded like he was ready to eat children). Also while Alex’s situation as a prostitute would seem like an immediate turn off thanks to how most media tends to handle sexuality in that manner, it’s never at any point played for titillation and effectively gets the message across about how uncomfortable it is for her (I imagine the author of the manga being a woman probably helped with this significantly). On the downside, the production values are a bit sub par for this kind of show, but there’re a few cool looking shots, and it’s got a pretty killer soundtrack. Overall this show’s off to a nice start and exudes enough cool to make it one of the top contenders of this season so far.
In Summary:
Gangsta’s first episode is a pretty cool one as it does a great job of setting up the atmosphere and tone of the show. While it doesn’t really do much to establish the characters aside from Alex, it works just well enough to keep things interesting and there’s already plenty of room for things to get juicier going forward. This is the coolest looking show of the season so far, and if you’re a fan of gritty westernized action stuff, you certainly can’t go wrong with this one.
Grade: A
Streamed By: FUNimation
