English Dub Review: Lord of Vermillion: The Crimson King “Our Lives are the Debt We Pay Our Enemies”

I hope you like the color red.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

So things kick off with a post-apocalyptic Japan bathed in red mist, and a whole bunch of super-powered teenagers duking it out over the ruined cityscape. Why? I couldn’t tell you, but the conclusion to all their death and destruction is that this terrible conflict seemed fated to happen. Or maybe not. Who knows?

Following that questionable way to introduce your anime, we go into the past and meet Chihiro and Kotetsu, who are Kendo buddies at the dojo Kotetsu’s dad owns and is the master of. They finish up their manly business and head off to what I think is a college campus. Just as they meet their friend for breakfast, a terrible high-pitched noise begins to emanate throughout the city. The noise brings the entire population to its knees as everyone fades into unconsciousness. As they do so, a menacing red mist covers the city.

Chihiro has a bizarre where a young loli wearing a mask named Dux appears to quote The Tempest at him and speak in bizarre and confusing metaphors. He plays it pretty cool, given his situation, but soon awakens in a hospital bed, attended by a doctor and a nurse. The two inform him that he’s been asleep for five months and that the city has succumbed to “The Great Collapse”, a cataclysmic event where red mist covered the city and an enormous plant began to emerge from the ground in serpentine branches. The city is safe, however, as some of the city is strangely untouched by the mist. In that area, the people lead a somewhat secure existence.

Chihiro meets up with Kotetsu, who’s also alright, and they head back to the dojo, only to find themselves succumbing to the same sinister sound once again, but this time the sound emanates from an edgy-looking man in thin sunglasses. Just then, the dojo explodes, and Kotetsu’s dad emerges as a disgusting monster who tries to kill the two boys. He stabs Chihiro right in the chest, but the boy still lives, and prepares to counterattack with some kind of magic.

Our Take:

Boy, was this a rocky start.

Lord of Vermillion comes into the anime scene as something of an unknown, being based on an “Arcade trading card game” developed by Square Enix that exists solely in the thriving arcade culture of Japan. This means that for an American audience, and for an audience unfamiliar with the game, this anime has a lot of work to do in conveying its complex and bizarre setting to the uninitiated. After having just watched this episode, I can honestly tell you I’m at something of a loss as to what is going on. Like watching “Evangelion” but without its humanity, its all flash but no meat, lots of aesthetic but nothing for me to sink my teeth into. A first episode’s job is to get me hooked in, but after enduring this, I’m just confused and somewhat annoyed.

It’s a bold move for an anime to show you its presumed “Ending” within the first five minutes of the show. Bold, but stupid. One of the key problems here is that watching all of these characters (Of which there are many) kill each other without any context is ultimately just a waste of time. I get the impression that the writers wanted to start their anime guns a-blazing, but have only served to reveal that they only had one bullet, and just shot it at the ground. It would be different, perhaps, if the direction was better, if the acting and writing were better so that I could get enveloped in the emotionality of watching all these handsome young people die; perhaps there could even be some mystery there. But this was executed poorly; I don’t care who these people are, I don’t know why they’re fighting, and I won’t remember their particular conflicts when we finally introduce them to the story.

Animation quality here is adequate, but nothing to write home about. I’ve certainly seen worse things, and some of the action sequences do hit their marks, but there is an essential “Generic-ness” that underscores everything. Our two protagonists look so similar that their only distinction seems to be hair color, and the accessory cast seems to be defined more by quirky modes of dress than real characterization. It’s sad, really. Anime is such a diverse, fluid medium with so much room for creativity, but time and time again we see these cheap cash-in shows use the most sell-able, generic character designs possible. Just going through the motions, filling in the blanks. Don’t expect to see anything new here.

It’s not wretched, but it’s boring and mediocre, especially for a first episode. The cast has failed to obtain my interest, and so has the plot and setting. After doing a little research into the background of this game, I think they could have really made something interesting here, but chose the easily marketable path instead. Disappointing, but not surprising.