English Dub Review: Listeners “In the Embrace of the Beat / When Doves Cry”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

On the road again, Echo and Mu find themselves in a glittering purple city ruled over by a Player named Denka who used to know Jimi. Both of them land jobs doing different tasks as they try and find a way to meet up with Denka and find out what he knows.

Eventually, they accept a challenge to battle Wendy and Lisa, two of the cities top champs. They fail the first time, but later on regain their confidence and fight them again, winning the battle and gaining the trust of Denka — who it turns out, was with them all along under cover. He tells them about what really happened to Jimi, and gives Mu a clue to her true identity.

Our Take:

The fifth episode of Listeners is pretty crazy. Following an episode that took place entirely in a school compound, it’s a lot to move into an entire city. There’s a ton of stuff going on during In the Embrace of the Beat / When Doves Cry, too, and a lot of it gets lost in the chaos. However, one can’t deny that there’s a certain thumping beat below all the noise, and that keeps me wanting to watch Listeners.

Mu and Echo actually don’t start the episode together. In a bit of a pointless turn, they argue about a futon and only wind up meeting each other in Denka’s city by chance. It’s a city all above “love and sexiness”, so of course they’re paired up by pretty much everyone they meet. Even Denka himself, the so-called god of love, tells Echo that his heart beats for Mu. Unfortunately, it’s just too big a stretch to make when the two of them have never really shared real chemistry. They’re both great characters in their own rights, and the two of them work well together, but I’ve never felt any romance between them. Rather, Echo seems more like her little (or big, depending on the episode) brother.

Speaking of brothers, it looks like Jimi Stonefree is going to turn out to be related in that way to Mu. Her true identity has always been a topic of conversation in the show, but based on the past several episodes, I was leaning towards it being more of a spiritual connection than an actual flesh and blood relation. But after Denka’s statements about how Jimi was inspired to become a Player due to his little sister dancing to the music, it seems obvious that Mu is that girl. How she wound up losing her memories is still uncertain, but it may have something to do with Gnome.

Way back when the traumatic event took place, Jimi was working with Gnome to build a world where people and the Earless could co-exist. It’s kind of a strange revelation, considering we’ve come to know the Earless as enemies and Jimi as a big hero to our protagonists. It’s an interesting twist that’s made all the more fascinating because it seems like Mu might be attracting the Earless based on what’s inside that necklace of hers. Did Jimi give it to her before he died? Is he dead? Did she steal it? These are some of the questions bouncing around my mind after this episode.

As for the plot itself, there’s really not a whole lot to speak well of. It’s convoluted, with random pit stops that find Mu taking some kind of strange phone sex job and Echo working with an old dude who steals his paycheck. All of these obstacles are supposedly bringing them together, culminating in the big battle with Wendy and Lisa. The battle itself is a let down, consisting of only a few moments that make Wendy and Lisa seem super easy to defeat. What’s worse is that it doesn’t look like the relationship between Mu and Echo even factored into it. I was waiting for them to confess their feelings, or unleash some hidden passions, but instead, they just enact the plan Echo laid out and get the win.

Listeners has been a confusing show so far — equal parts original and repetitive, interesting and convoluted. It’s a series with a lot of meat on its bones, and I can’t help but feel like it’s not even sure what it wants to say in some places, this episode in particularly. Hopefully it’ll tune up and get back to the main melody next week.