A small ripple in the pond of time has great ramifications for all of mankind.
What They Say:
“Boogiepop at Dawn”
The Review
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Boogiepop took me by surprise this week and dropped 4 whole episodes, one self-contained arc, all at once as a special. They did this because the series is slated at 18 episodes and they’re trying to fit it in a single season, rather than two. So we get the entirety of the Boogiepop origin story all at once to digest. Rather than do a review of each episode I too shall drop it all at once in this single review, because that’s how the audience is going to be watching it.
This arc starts on an unsettling note as we watch Echoes arrive in what appears to be a desolate, destroyed Earth. He is alone except for the presence of Boogiepop, and this scene closes out the arc as well. Where, or when this scene takes place is entirely unknown. Is it where Boogiepop ends up when not surfaced in Touka? Why is Echoes there? Well, it serves as a way for Boogiepop to explain why they do what they do. So we enter a flashback to years earlier.
This arc introduces several new characters, including three agents of the Towa organization. There is Scarecrow, a detective who is working to find the over-evolved humans and to report them back to his superiors. His contact, the informant Pigeon, and a Towa hitman who works under the alias of Mo Murder. Much like Aya, these three are not pure evil. They’re constantly watched by their organization though, and stepping out of line means they’re no longer useful.
Events are kicked into motion when Scarecrow investigates a local hospital for evidence of over-evolved humans. He finds a young Nagi Kirima, who is bold and mischievous, and suffering from severe unexplained pain. He takes a liking to the girl, and Nagi starts to develop a crush on the detective. That puts him at odds with his orders, as Nagi is clearly undergoing a change which would make her a target of elimination.
Scarecrow saves Nagi, going against orders and making him a target for elimination.
The carelessness of the way he saved her sets off a chain reaction that creates an unexpected monster. One which ruthlessly hunts down young women, scares them, and then murders and mutilates them, consuming their brains. The enemy of this arc is truly terrifying, and the climactic action scenes where Nagi and Boogiepop take them down is animated in a way which heightens the frantic, fearful actions. It’s brutal and intense, loose in a visceral way which shows that these evolved and artificial humans truly aren’t what we think of as human.
This arc also shows what happened to Nagi’s father, the famous author, and gives us a good idea of what he was like as a person. When they described him as an author you get the impression of a shut-in distant father, but that’s far from the case. He was calm, loving and supportive of his daughter, which makes his death all that more tragic. You begin to understand why Nagi takes up her crusade as a vigilante.
As for Touka, we learn that she’s aware she has a split personality or at least is told so by her mother. We aren’t given any more of the details of what lead to her mother dragging her into a hospital for evaluation, other than the fact she claims Touka’s alter-ego attacked her and her father. Touka is far shyer and more awkward than when we see her later in high school, and Boogiepop hasn’t fully managed to form an idea of its own identity inside her yet.
This arc does a masterful job of weaving small, separate moments in time together to fill in some gaps in both motivation and history. Not just for Nagi, but for the Imaginator, Boogiepop, and the Towa Organization. We have a far better idea of what the Towa Organization’s goal is now, and how their motives are twisted and perhaps not what’s best for mankind. The animation and direction in this arc are solid, and the monster the girls face off against truly horrific.
In Summary:
This arc takes us way back to the beginning, and in doing so knits together many of the later connections between various characters and factions in the world of Boogiepop. The focus on evolution could be taken at face value, but it also applies to the characters themselves as we see how Nagi and Touka become the heroes of humanity that they are in the present. It also tells a good, straightforward horror story that is full of both tragedy and victory, and perseverance in the face of abject and total defeat. I wish the story could have started on this arc, but the impact from many of the key moments shown would have been lost. Boogiepop continues to build, arc upon arc, and as it becomes more confident in its pacing and storytelling.
Episode Arc Grade: A –
Streamed by: Crunchyroll & Funimation
