“No more running. We’re taking out Satou.”
Episode 12
I didn’t write a review for last week’s episode simply because I felt that there was not enough to talk about. The entire episode was the capturing of Satou. Or the attempted capturing would be more accurate. We saw Tosaki’s plan come into fruition. The Special Police force surrounded Satou and immediately shot him the head with their guns before he could do anything, instantly killing him. They have plenty of men on ground, while also having snipers in different spots far away to handle Satou if something were to happen. Following Tosaki’s plan, the police men would shoot at Satou every three seconds before he would even have the chance to revive himself. They would carry him on a stretcher, shooting every three seconds. Things were going pretty smoothly until some of the policemen were shot at by none other than the other Ajin working with Satou. To keep things short, Tosaki’s plan failed. Satou was able to revive and just cause hell and kill every single man there. And with that, he was able to walk away with no problem, causing the damage that he had wanted to. Fail.
Tosaki’s plan was actually really smart. But one problem. Why the hell didn’t any of the men think to take away the gun Satou had on him in case he was able to revive? The reason why Satou was able to attack so fast was because he still had the gun in his possession. If one of them had been smart enough to actually take away the gun, just to be extra safe, and of course smart, then things probably would have gone differently. But, even though the episode was exciting, there was still something else that was bothering me. They were shooting multiple bullets at his head. Those bullets were turning his brain into goo. So, I would believe that reviving yourself from a death like that would take longer than reviving yourself from one simple gun shot. But it wasn’t one bullet, it was multiple. And they kept damaging the brain, over and over, so wouldn’t it take a little longer to revive, since the head is so important to an Ajin? But Satou was able to revive rather quickly, which I thought was bullshit. Plot armor? *nods* Plot armor.
Episode 13
This episode was even more exciting than the last! Episode 12 left us with a newswoman announcing on the news of the situation at the once Grant Pharmaceuticals, while also putting up the pictures of Satou, Tanaka, and Kei onscreen. Hearing the news of the 100 million yen reward for giving news of the whereabouts of an Ajin, the greedy man that never trusted Kei recognized his picture and called the police.
Uh oh.
Kei is oblivious to this, and he and Granny go out and pull weeds. Before, he had sent a message to someone. I wonder who? Granny notices that a neighbor of theirs isn’t out in her field, and thinks it’s weird. Kei looks around, and notices no one but them. We saw before the chief from before, Araki, mention that the police told everyone to stay in their homes. He also made a weird face when he found out who Kei was with, and I’m wondering if he’s her son. Kei doesn’t like this and tells Granny that they should head back inside, but right then he’s shot. The police charge in and once Kei revives, he holds one of the gardening tools to her throat so no one would shoot at him. He apologizes to her, but she doesn’t mind. Actually, she thinks it’s pretty thrilling, like they’re in a movie. Which I thought was funny and kind of cute to hear at that moment. Funny, Kei says he doesn’t care about people but he really did seem apologetic to Granny, and when he said his last goodbye to her, he did seem grateful for everything she did for him. I’m sure he really was enjoying his peaceful life there, and unfortunately he knew he couldn’t stay there anymore. I still don’t understand this kid.
Sending out his IBM to attack the police, he said his last goodbye to Granny and ran off. He continued to run into the forest, trying to get away from the police even though he was wounded with bullets. The rest of the episode was another big chase for Kei, but this one was very exciting! Still having Nakano’s phone, Kei made a call and set the phone in a shed, tricking the police (and Tosaki) to run after Nakano there, while Kei would run to where Nakano really was, and set him free. The two run away to where a road is, and they’re about to escape, but they see police cars, and Nakano is suddenly shot at with a tranquilizer gun by none other than Tosaki.
We had a very cool fight afterwards. Tosaki also shot Kei with a tranquilizer, but knowing what fate would await him if he were captured, Kei mustered all his strength to summon another IBM, even when he’s supposed to be at his limit. Tosaki made the big mistake of shooting at both Kei and Nakano with a regular gun, because it ended up killing them and letting them revive. He thought that if he killed them the IBM would disappear. Shimomura sent out her own IBM to fight off Kei’s, but while the boys ran off stealing guns, Kei would continue to regenerate more IBM, which is not normal. Nakano uses his gun to shoot at a police car’s gas tank, and caused an explosion, giving them the perfect opportunity to escape.
The episode ends with Mr. Greedy not getting his money because it was all a rumor, and the boys making their escape. Kei says they aren’t going to run this time, but this time they are going to take down Satou. I really want to know how they’re going to do that. In the end, Satou also makes another video detailing his second wave, “Purification”. Which is murdering the 15 people involved in the whole conspiracy. And if treatment against Ajin still isn’t improved, he’ll move on to his third and final wave: Ruling the country. And at the end of the video, he opened his eyes. And when you see a character who’s eyes are usually closed finally open them, you know it’s bad. And I’m not gonna lie, after that long pause when he opened them, I was actually a little scared. But I was mostly like “AAHHHHHHH HE OPENED HIS EYES!!!! :DDDDDDD”
Final Impression
What an exciting end! A second movie is going to be coming out next month, so I’m not sure if they’re going to do the same thing where if they make an anime again, they take scenes from the movie and put them together, and then have a few episodes of stuff that wasn’t in the movie. If so, I’m not sure if I’d cover it. Here’s one thing about Ajin. Even though it has a cool story, maybe a little generic, I felt that sometimes it could be a little slow. I don’t know if it’s like that in the manga, but I felt the pacing to be slow sometimes where I thought some episodes were a little boring. Sometimes reviewing week by week is fun, other times it feels like a hassle. So if there is another season, I would maybe opt out and just do one big review. Though I’d have to think on it, since I feel like more exciting things are to come.
Like I said, Ajin’s story is a little generic. We have the main character who seems normal but turns out isn’t, being a supernatural being. And a special one at that, as we saw when he produced multiple IBM. These supernatural beings, Ajin, are being mistreated. I’ve seen stuff like this before, but I think I like it better because of Satou and his crazy actions. Usually you would choose peaceful negotiations for rights, but Satou is a straight up terrorist. He’s a terrorist, causing fear and havoc among the people. His methods are over the top, and I find him to be an interesting character.
Characters themselves, I think was the main problem. I didn’t feel connected to any of them, I don’t know if I particularly like anyone. Kai was in for a little bit, then forgotten about. Same with the sister. I know what kind of person Tosaki is, and I know he’s working hard for his fiancee, and I know his life is in even more danger after that failed attempt at capturing two Ajin, but for some reason I still can’t feel for him. Kei is a special guy. I felt bad for him in the beginning, I still do, but his personality is weird. He can actually be really heartless and rude, and he claims to have never cared about people, but there were times where he actually showed generosity and actual emotion when it came to Kai and Granny. So I can’t really pinpoint who he is exactly, and that makes me interested in him too. Everyone else doesn’t feel so significant to me, there hasn’t been much character development, so that’s a real turn off.
But I think the biggest thing about Ajin that may have been a turn off for people was the CGI. I will honestly say that I’m not a fan of CGI, so I was a little wary about this show even though I was liking the plot. But really after one episode I was already used to the CGI because I thought the CGI was done really well. Sometimes the movements seemed a little clunky, but I noticed later on, and in certain fight scenes, that the CGI was done extremely well. The fights scenes were a joy to watch. I know people aren’t used to this kind of animation, but trust me I’ve seen worse uses of CGI that were so ugly I couldn’t even watch three minutes. But this is not the case, I thought it was done well.
Ajin is going to have two more movies so of course the story is going to be continuing on. I’m excited to see what’ll happen next. I will have to admit that I felt like the anime could be boring at times, and I think the lack of good characters contribute to that, but Ajin was still a fun watch for me. I thought the animation was fine, it had stellar music with a rockin’ OP, the story was a little generic but still interesting for me, and Satou is crazy as hell. Can’t wait to see more.
7/10
Episode 12 – there’s a manga I’ve been reading for a while now named Darwin’s Game. In chapter 27, the police get involved – and get slaughered like a bunch of incompetent morons. Sure, if these SAT guys in Ajin were really that good they would have known to put some distance between themselves and Satou after he got free instead of giving him more meat shields. And of course, they would have disarmed him the first chance they got like you said. Still, I won’t complain too much exactly because they looked good in comparison with other such stories.