Otakuism

On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: eight SYNAPSE ATTACK’s,seven GARO’s, six OH GAWDS YUNO IS MOE!, five ZERO!, four VOLTEKKA!, three PRIMAL SCREAMS OF HOT BLOODED FURY!, two(million) RONs!, and one GIGA DRILL BREAKER!

This is the eigth post in a series as I look at the twelve best anime moments of the year from shows I watched. Key there being watched, as a few of these moments are going to be from some pretty old stuff, but I think they’re damn good enough to talk about at any time. This is a joint ABC blogging project with other contributions from Roxas, CCYoshi, Orion, Owen S, Xerox, Nekoron, Martin, Michael Huang, usagijen, and Moogy. Yeah, there’s a lot of us. And if you haven’t seen Betterman then go watch it now, as this post contains huge, story ruining ending spoilers.

Sorry to have to post this a day late. Yesterday was just too busy to get anything written. ‘Tis the season for parties after all. To me Betterman is the best horror anime ever made, though that may not be saying much because there’s relatively little horror anime. Anyways, Betterman definitely has the most shocking and tragic ending of any anime I’ve ever seen. To me it’s even worse than End of Eva, and ironically that makes it one of the most memorable moments of the year for me. The whole final arc of Betterman is just rife with tragedy. Keita and Hinoki both drown in the ocean and the show makes you think they’re dead till the very last minute; Miyako finds out she’s a carrier for Algernon, the very disease she’s been fighting, before being summarily executed; Sakura falls into a coma, and worst of all is the fate of Shou and Kaede.

Just days after getting married and discovering Kaede is pregnant they go with the others to rescue Hinoki from Mode Warp HQ. After defeating all of the nigh-indestructible mass-produced neuronoids, and the one moment where things look hopeful, is when Kaede begins acting weird. Shou realizes she has contracted Algernon and tries to comfort Kaede that she can control it, but the disease has already affected her mind and she kills them both in a double suicide synapse attack. Shou’s words before he dies, “God can’t be this cruel to us,” are the most tragic I’ve heard in any anime. However, they’re child does survive amazingly, since it was born from two powerful psychics. Thus does Shou and Kaede’s tragedy highlight the main theme of Betterman, that no matter how inhuman and cruel the world can seem, the evolutionary cycle of life and death is necessary for humanity to continue to live. It is a harsh message as shown through the dark demise of Shou and Kaede, but also interestingly hopeful. I like that kind of dichotomy my thinking anime, and I love Betterman the more for it, despite its tragic elements.