Garo returns to it’s roots in one sense, but might shed its previous audience along the way.
What They Say:
In the capital city of an elegant, feudal society, a powerful spiritual barrier protects people from demonic monsters known as “horrors”—at least, those lucky enough to live in the northern part of the city. For the commoners who live to the south, it’s a completely different story. As soon as night falls, the horrors begin their dark hunt, feasting on the souls of any humans who cross their path. Against unbeatable odds, the fate of the city will fall to a small group of warriors dedicated to protecting the citizens and fighting through the night.
Episode #1: “Onmyou”
Within the capital, there are rumors of evil spirits causing mischief in the night. Among those spirits hide creatures from Makai called Horrors that feed on humans. It is up to Makai Knights and Alchemists to destroy them and protect the people.
The Review
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Last fall’s Garo: The Animation ended up being one of the season’s surprise hits. Based on the tokusatsu series of the same name, last year’s series moved the setting to the Spanish Inquisition, or a facsimile thereof. This series is not a direct sequel to that. It’s still MAPPA in charge, but with a different staff for this project. Now we have director Atsushi Wakabayashi (Guin Saga), series composer Shou Aikawa (Ghost Slayers Ayashi, The Twelve Kingdoms), and character designs by Masakazu Katsura (Tiger & Bunny, I”s). Garo: Crimson Moon moves the setting back to a fictionalized Japan, way back to Japan, back to the Heian Era. That’s not the only change, the character designs and style of artwork is radically different. However, the premise remains familiar. There are makai knights, gifted with magical suits of armor, who fight against horrors which attack humans. They are assisted by makai priests in this battle. That’s the basics of it.
We’re introduced to a capital city in a Heian style culture. The wealthy and noble live in an inner city protected by priests from the demon horrors which roam the night devouring the lower class citizens who fall prey to the darkness. Confronting this landscape of death is Seimei, a woman onmyoji (and a gender-swap of the historical male onmyoji), who with a saucy smile and a wave of her paint brush can bring down a divine wrath against the skeletal horrors. By day she’s a simple musician, earning favor for her looks as much as her musical talent. When this series was first announced they said it would have a heroine in charge, and I certainly wasn’t expecting a mature woman stealing the spotlight.
Elsewhere we’re introduced to our golden knight, Raikou. He has ridiculous hair and seems to rely on Seimei a bit more than he’d like to. We don’t really learn much about him in his episode, he already has his armor and title. He’s accompanied by a kid named Kintoki, who might possibly be his brother and who I’m already sick of. They head out to investigate a statue which was supposed to be blessed to ward off evil. Instead, it becomes the tool of the horrors, and the woodcarver responsible for trying to appease the spirits instead becomes consumed by darkness. He sacrifices beautiful women trying to imbue his art. It’s not exactly the most original monster-of-the-week plot, I’ve seen the tortured artist gone evil in so many shows.
Seimei lures him out with herself as bait. However she can’t destroy a horror of his level on her own, she’s not a knight. It’s Raikou’s turn to step up and show us what a knight is capable of. So both our leads switch into more modern, and certainly more anime, costumes and dispatch the bad guy with very little effort inside a closed space where the danger feels exceedingly minimal. We even meet the man who I’m guessing is our big bad by the end of the episode. He certainly looks the part and is causing the trouble you’d expect.
The music here is certainly a bit unusual for the setting. It’s more latin inspired, which would have made more sense in the previous series than this one. The opening song and animation are striking, if not as memorable as last year’s first opening. The ending features some smooth CG animation but the song isn’t as good as the opening. The musical cues during the episode are exaggerated, leaving little to the imagination about who the bad guys are. The animation is likewise a bit odd. The character designs are fairly detailed but sometimes the animation looks and moves more like a western cartoon like Avatar. The backgrounds have a textured painterly quality that’s bright and angular. It’s an unusual mishmash of inspirations that doesn’t entirely work.
In Summary:
Garo: Crimson Moon isn’t grabbing me from the get-go the way that last year’s story did. It doesn’t do a very good job introducing new viewers to the mythology. The leads are simple ciphers right now, the setting a generic pastiche of the Pillow Book and the tokusatsu cheese is running thick. The animation feels uneven and the action lacks danger and drama. When it wants to the show looks nice, with the color pallet shifting to accompany the action nicely. The rest of the time it feels simple and hokey. The mixed styles of music, setting, and costume don’t really gel. For much of this first episode the action felt disjointed and lacking dramatic weight, and what little humor was present was flat. Still, this is the same studio as the last Garo, and I’m not about to write off the entire show due to a slow start. Hopefully, they start to explain the world and setting more and delve into our leads in the next episode.
Episode Grade: C
Streamed by: Funimation
Review Equipment: 27” iMac running OS 10.10.3, via Safari 8.0.6, FIOS 15/5 Mbps connection. Your mileage may vary.
I’m curious to know whether this should be regarded as really an entirely separate series, sharing the same origins, or is it taking place in the same universe.