The Story Thus Far - Sankarea Episode 3

Hello readers! Josh has been kind enough to offer me a position as a writer on his blog, so I've packed up my bags from my own blog at Moe Life, No Life, and made the transition over here. I'll begin resuming my regular articles from there, and add in some new stuff along the way!

This week, we have The Story Thus Far with Sankarea Episode 3.

Sankarea is one of those weird stories that's great, don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely in love with it, but there's just so much wrong with it as well.

We'll start from the beginning, and the most glaring thing. The main character is pretty much a necrophiliac. I mean, anime isn't exactly prudent when it comes to staying within social norms, and neither is the Japanese artistic sense. But seriously, the guy comes out flat out and says he wants only to be with a zombie. Yeah, he's a kid, I get that, but at the same token it's clear he's probably never been in the presence of an actual decomposing body because let's face it.

It's not exactly the first thing I think of when I think of sexy.

But whatever, onto the anime.

For those not in the loop, Sankarea is about a boy named Chihiro who is a zombie nerd, much like all of us are (subject) nerds in our own right. He lives with his senile grandfather, straight-faced father, Nagato-esque sister, and cat, Babu. Or at least, he did, until one day Babu gets hit by a truck.

Chihiro, having found a book with an unfinished recipe for a revival potion, decides to experiment with various combinations in order to find the perfect concoction with which to bring his poor cat back to life...Despite the fact that the body would have started decomposing by now.

Moving on.

He conducts these Frankenstein experiments in an abandoned building on the edge of a hill overlooking the town, a dark, dusty bowling alley hidden away from society. With how many abandoned buildings you see in Japanese anime, it's hard to believe that it's a modern world country and not just filled with abandoned buildings.

Then, one night, he hears a shouting from the well in the courtyard of the complex, to which he sees a young girl screaming her problems into the well. This girl is the title character, Rea Sanka, or Sanka Rea. The two begin to talk, and become friends.

In this week's episode we've reached the main climax of the first part of the show. Rea, who is faced with an extremely overprotective father with a case of obsessive compulsive psuedo-pedophilia, has found out Rea has been sneaking out at night to meet a boy, and is not happy, as such banning her from going out again and on the move to castrate Chihiro. Literally.

Babu has also been revived, although his disposition is...questionable. Which makes sense, being a zombie and all. So the search is on to find out what the hell is wrong with Babu and Rea is on her mission to find Chihiro before populating with corpses becomes impossible for him. (Not that he honestly had a chance in hell before, but I digress)


The Episode in Pictures

The third episode starts out with a brief recollection of the night before. I for one, love Rea's voice. It's so cute and adorable and it makes me smile. The scene is a little cliche, but it's a nice kind of cliche you don't really get tired of seeing.

The opening sequence for this anime starts as one of the best on the season. There's a lot going on but not enough to distract, and the flow/continuity matches with the art direction and color chemistry really well to create an engaging and fun environment that reflects the show as a whole.

It also plays important elements of the plot into the opening, easily identifying the characters and defining who they are. Some may think this makes the characters one-sided and bland, but I think they'll present a good amount of depth later on, and it's a good illustration of what an opening is and what it needs to convey in the short minute and a half.

Not to mention the visuals are just great, even the smaller characters who aren't Chihiro and Rea are in display, and it's good to see such an important attention to detail which is fairly consistent even in the animation proper.

Everything about this character just pisses me off. After the opening, Rea wakes up to find the potion she stole from Chihiro, made out of poisonous hydrangea, did not kill her. Depressed, she puts on her war face and greets her parents as if nothing happened. Just sort of accepting her father's demands and never stepping outside again.

Told you literally. Despite confining his daughter inside forever, Danichiro still wants to make an example, and orders his butler to go casterate Chihiro. Rea overhears this, and sneaks out to warn Chihiro.

Zombie cat. Back at the shrine in which Chihiro lives, Babu has revived...sort of. Leading Chihiro and his forever friend-zoned childhood friend through town on a wild chase.

I would fuck the drunk right out of those eyes. (The mother) Clearly, there's an inferiority complex with Rea's mother, who spends her days getting drunk and not being fully dressed. Danichiro obviously dislikes his wife for this, hopefully they'll develop on it later on.

Rea makes her defiant stance against her father. It's important to note how well the anime is at illustrating drama. The whole scene slows down here and doesn't actually show her batting her father's hand away, but part in of that is the emphasis on not needing to see it, you don't often see someone hitting you, but you feel it. I think that was the same thing they were going for here.

Ow. After cornering Rea on a ledge near the abandoned bowling alley they call their hideout, Danichiro forces Rea to trip and fall off a cliff, tearing open her abdomen on a piece of extended wood, killing her in the process.

But, she drank the zombie potion, and awakes moments later as a zombie with a torn open abdomen, and in a drunken stupor, stumbles over to Chihiro and reminds him he said he would take responsibility for her being a zombie.

And so, our story really begins.

The ending sequence is short with not a whole lot to it, but there's the same importance to detail that really goes to pull this show above the others. This is almost like a throwback to the days when this kind of animation was commonplace, which is a breath of fresh air in an industry that sits on it's laurels more than half the time as it is.

In closing, so far so good. Sankarea has a lot to bring to the table and is showing to be one of the better shows this season. Let's hope it can keep this momentum and deliver a good experience that can renew faith in the anime industry for next season!

-Kageryu