Kyousogiga TV – 01-02

So I’ve faffed about and procrastinated for a few weeks, but I finally decided that I wanted to write about this show this season….well this and Samurai Flamenco, but I’ll get round to writing that post tomorrow.

As I’ve said before I loved Kyousogiga’s OVA in all its glorious incomprehensibility, but I am so glad the TV series is much easier to follow.  What we have here is a very simple central story about a divided family trying to come back together again set in a rather fantastical world – but there is just so much heart and attention poured into this show that it elevates to a whole new level.  I loved these past two episodes!  There is just so much going on in this show – the allusions to Alice in Wonderland, mythology and use of symbolism all make it a very rewarding show to watch, every detail is there to add something to the show, even if you don’t actively notice it.  You can tell that this show is a labour of love for this Toei team.

Episode one introduced the family to us – the father (Myoue) being an outcast monk with the ability to breathe life into his drawings, the mother (Koto) being one of those drawings (a black rabbit) given life by a Bodhisattva to pursue her love of her creator, and the three children (Yakushimaru, Yase & Kurama) they have together.  We’re also shown the perfect world Myoue created for his family to live in free of persecution – the Mirror Capital, an idealised version of Kyoto, where nothing breaks and no-one dies.  It all gets more interesting when the family splits up.  Koto has to give her borrowed body back to the Bodhisattva and Myoue goes after her leaving the three children to grow up in the Mirror Capital alone.   Yakushimaru takes on his father’s name & role as monk and with Yase & Kurama form the Council of Three who rule over the Mirror Capital while waiting for their parents to return.

Meanwhile episode two gives us a look at the past of the other Koto – the hammer wielding teenager who crash lands into the Mirror Capital at the end of episode one.  This Koto is raised by a man wearing a fox mask who sounds exactly like the original Myoue and who also has a picture of the rabbit Koto and the Mirror Capital in his home.  There is a notable resemblance between the young Koto and her teacher, but as of yet it hasn’t been confirmed that they are related, and while the OVA’s seemed to suggest that there is a connection between hammer-wielding Koto and rabbit Koto that hasn’t been brought up in the TV show yet.  The narration appears to suggest an element of reincarnation to the show and there is definitely a few alternate realities in the mix – at least three so far anyway (original Kyoto, Mirror Capital & hammer-Koto’s original world), so the show is incredibly layered even in the basic groundwork.

So we’ve got all this thrown at us in the first two episodes alone, all wrapped up in this beautifully animated package stuffed full of bright colours and fabulous direction – Kyousogiga has everything going for it at the moment.  These two initial episodes were all just laying the foundations for the real story to start now with hammer-Koto shaking things up in the rather static Mirror Capital.  Kyousogiga’s success is going to hinge on whether it can meld the chaotic energy of the OVA with believable characters and an engaging plot.  It is definitely off to an exceptionally solid start, if the rest of the series is as good as these past two episodes, Kyousogiga will be sure of a place in my favourites – can’t wait for the next episode which seems to be focusing on Kurama.