Active Raid – 12 [END]
Watch your back door around her!
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The moral of this anime is that siscons ruin everything. |
The good news is that the finale wasn’t a heaping pile of garbage, which was pretty much where my expectations were set. This was a decent way to round things off, although it didn’t really feel much like a big bang final episode to me. It was more like a regular Active Raid episode. I suppose that can happen when a show is already greenlit for another season and there’s more to come, but it doesn’t make the unsatisfying end any less disappointing. It’s not good when a show ends with me going “is that it?”.
I like how their reasoning for not killing him is “BUT HE’S A MINOR”
Mythos finally has his past revealed in a whirlwind of information that was basically just scooped up over the internet. I don’t know why someone didn’t just do a google search themselves if it was going to be this easy. It turns out Mythos is so bitter because he was part of a crazy cult that separated him from his sister. He assumed that she committed suicide, and thus blamed it all on Japanese society as a whole. Hell, I’d be mad if a cult ruined my life as well, but I think I’d extract my revenge on the cult itself instead of the entirety of Japan. But hey, whatever works when you’re an angsty minor and a genius! But when all the cards are revealed, it becomes obvious that Mythos really isn’t in this to be evil, he’s just lashing out in pain. Once he’s given a chance to change his life and actually connect with others (namely his long-lost sister), he surrenders.
He surrenders too easily though. I didn’t like that Mythos was beaten at the drop of a hat. All it took was mentioning his sister potentially being alive (which could have easily been a bluff) to win him over. Even Bird’s message to him about abandonment could have been a ruse constructed by Unit 8, since we saw them use voice modulation software to have their own concert at the beginning of the series. It just seems like Mythos suddenly reverted to a big mess of emotions when before this he was completely stoic and rational. If the chinks in his armour were revealed more gradually, I would have been more satisfied. Revealing everything about him all at once in the finale was a bad move that made what should have been a personal moment feel like a cheap cop-out move to end things quickly.
The part that did interest me was Bird’s role in all this. He takes the position of a more traditional villain, backstabbing anyone he deems as being unworthy and causing chaos wherever he goes. Unlike Mythos, Bird doesn’t have any weaknesses (yet) that leave him open to being betrayed. I like the idea of Bird coming back in season 2 as yet another mastermind, because he works well as a creepy final boss. He’s charming, but the underlying edge of psychopathy becomes apparent whenever we see his complete disregard for other human beings. The way he played Mythos was a nice twist, because originally it seemed like he was slightly inferior to Mythos. How nice of him to go out of his way to send a personalized soundbite to Mythos just so he knows he got screwed over by his only friend!
In the end, the finale was a rather simple cat and mouse affair, much like previous episodes. All of Japan being under the control of Mythos didn’t seem to actually do much except make a bunch of moms gather in a shopping district and argue. Buildings weren’t collapsing, people weren’t dying, no one was trying to escape on inflatable rafts…It didn’t seem like Mythos taking over the city really did much at all, so it wasn’t very exciting. He threatened to do things, but never really got a chance to act on it. What an uncreative way to show someone dominating Japan. It was an anti-climactic finish that ended in the blink of an eye. After some fancy Willwear combat, they took him down and everything was quickly restored to normal. Then everyone goes out to party because they’re relieved the show is done and they don’t have to do this shit again until the next season airs.
Listen. Active Raid is not a good show. I don’t know how any of you reading this made it this far because I would have dropped it if I didn’t already commit to blogging it. My problem with Active Raid is that it is incredibly shallow in everything it does. It tries to tackle complex political issues, but ends up glossing over all of them. It also tries to cram in a new character study each week, but that also fails because everyone is nothing but a paper-thin stereotype, so there’s nothing to expand on. Even if it does dig up some interesting points, like one character secretly being a gambling queen, it never revisits them again and it’s like all that “development” was for naught. Active Raid only does a decent job when it goes full-on corny and throws robot hologram idol concerts into the mix. It can’t do a mix of goofy and serious and it certainly can’t do serious…so all I’m left with is the mildly amusing memory of Kazari performing a concert and mimicking a trap idol while a baby pink camera mech watches on in awe.
I clearly picked the wrong show to blog and let’s hope I pick better next season. Yikes.
An apple a day keeps TOTAL DOMINATION at bay
About Overcooled
A neuroscience graduate, black belt, and all-around nerd. You'll either find me in my lab or curled up in my rilakkuma kigurumi watching anime.
POWUH: Meta Resident and LN Informant with 1529 comments
Slight correction to your review, Overcooled:
I think it was the Japanese government that wouldn’t let Mythos leave Japan with his sister – they didn’t want him rallying the overseas cult members. The ones who committed suicide were his parents, in the mass suicide.
In this context it would make sense for him to want to get revenge against the bureaucracy that separated him from his sibling and indirectly imprisoned him in Japanese society.
That said, I’m interested to see if the gambler girl and the blonde mechanic get to suit up in Willwears next season.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Ahh I see. In that case it makes sense for him to be mad at both, but to direct his anger towards those who took his sister away.
The mechanic didn’t get much screen time, did he? Guess they’re saving him for season 2
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
You haven’t talked like that since the end of Tokyo Ghoul’s first season.
As good an end as possibly permitted. For me in particular, I made it this far with Active Raid because after watching the first few episodes, I got the grasp needed to asses and determined it was never meant to go beyond its established level. The series became a base means of killing time as a result, therefore needing little to no expectation at all if choosing to press on. So wanting it to do more past it’s already confirmed limited capabilities would be asking for too much when we know better. So I can’t say I was disappointed with the show’s run. I’m rather indifferent, to be perfectly honest.
When the second half comes along and if I do choose to watch, it would be for the same sake as the first: A means to pass the time.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Yeppppp
Yeah, I can see Active Raid being the kind of show that’s a time-killer and it’s more effort to stop watching than continue. Total indifference is better than disappointment!
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
Maybe we should pick shows for each other to blog. Not that you would have wanted to do HaruChika, tho. 🙂
Flying Shoes… maaaaaaybe.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Haha we should do that for one season to see what happens. It’d probably work out for me because I’m so bad at picking.
Actually, Haruchika was way better than Flying Shoes!
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
I’m pretty down for us suggesting a show to for another writer to blog. I don’t know how we would set it up though.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Hmm…Maybe we ask Kyokai because she is the master!
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
I think HaruChika and Flying Shoes! were two different types of shows when you get down to it. But, I’ll let Highway talk about that in due course…
POWUH: iLurker with 8 comments
There is no such thing as an universal, static definition of a “good” show. Otherwise, no series that any human being or collection of people ever dropped could possibly be ever considered “good” by anyone else.
Active Raid was good at being what the staff intended: shallow fun. They literally said this in public. Which isn’t necessarily what you personally wanted or consider to be good, but some others (like me) can deal with it and would therefore argue differently. I wasn’t bored at all by the series myself, even though I was also not particularly excited. It was a purely normal watch for me.
Not every show needs to be deep, meaningful or profound. I absolutely don’t think the show was seriously “tackling complex political issues” either. Just because it poked fun at a couple of its politicians and occasionally showed them arguing with each other doesn’t imply total serious business. Quite the opposite. That seems like a rather weak accusation to me, since the silly tone and whimsical style of the show was always in line with the simplistic portrayal of that subject matter.
By the same token, I can’t really agree with your issues in terms of the cast. Considering the show has another 12 episodes left, it had no forceful obligation to develop every single character in a huge manner this season. Each of those episodes still provided some extra focus and establishing info, which may or may be addressed in different ways by the time S2 comes around.
The fact you didn’t care for, disliked or ignored several of those episodes doesn’t mean there wasn’t a minimum of initial expansion. That doesn’t mean it needed to be revisited every other week in order to make those points valid.
Thankfully, my memory seems to be working quite different from yours. But sure, I think you should have stopped blogging this if you were going to treat it like a chore.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Oh Hunter…You clearly really enjoy Active Raid and the fact that I don’t enjoy it as much is disappointing to you. I have no idea how you survived an entire season of blog posts written by me. Maybe the solution here was that you should have stopped reading if my dislike of Active Raid was so upsetting.
Don’t let me spoil your fun, man. Just because the show isn’t good for me, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have to be good for other people.
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
We’re gonna have to call you “OverSiren” from now on…You lead this poor reader astray and dashed them on the rocks. Let us bid a fond farewell to the stuff we found on the rocks…
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
A burial at sea? Nice and old fashioned.
By the way, it’s the sailor’s fault for being swayed by the siren if he doesn’t have strong mental fortitude. Temptation is a bitch to deal with. 😛
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
Well, that’s Siren Song in a nutshell, it get’s past all mental toughness, by appealing to the other half that lead men around.
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1692 comments
As a former sailor I can say after a few weeks at sea it doesn’t take much to lead you astray.
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
We are all Ulysses
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1692 comments
I don’t think it was really a bad show, but it wasn’t a good one either. Basically it was a mildly entertaining way to kill time. But waiting so long to suddenly reveal everything about Mythos was a mistake and having him beaten so easily just by mentioning his sister was probably still alive overseas was even worse. Plus, he made for a bad villain since he was so boring. Bird would have been much better as the boss villain.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Yeah, it wasn’t so offensive that I felt like I absolutely had to drop it and get as far away from it as I needed to be. It did ok most of the time.
If they did a sudden reveal where Bird was the one really in control, I would have been a lot more impressed. Definitely a cooler villain than Mythos.
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1692 comments
Spammy strikes again.