English Dub Review: Boogiepop and Friends “Vs Imaginator 2”

A love triangle.

Overview:

Imaginator’s seeds run deep.

Our Take:

This story is split into two parts: one of Taniguchi and Orihata, and one of Anou getting into a lot of supernatural trouble.

Taniguchi and Orihata are the two people that Asukai saved last time, and now we have some context to the situation. Taniguchi is a transfer student, and in trying to be nice and not stand out, he ended up standing out and attracting the ire of his male classmates. Orihata interferes in his bullying, and the two manage to escape. His attachment to Orihata feels very pure like he’s glad that he’s finally formed a connection to someone, even if that connection feels one-sided. He’s a good kid, which means he won’t last in this show.

Orihata is a quiet, strange girl, filled with not a lot of confidence, and she likely has some connection to Towa. At the same time, she rings true, the ‘is this real?’ ‘are they actually going to leave me’, is something closer to anxiety. Asukai says she is a lot more concerned than she puts on, and he’s probably correct. Whether because it’s because she’s not perfect- I do think she might be a synthetic human herself, considering she keeps wondering of whether she’s deserving of love- or just an anxious girl with low confidence, I’m glad she managed to hit it off with Taniguchi. They are pretty cute together, and evidently, they do enjoy each other’s presence, conspiracy or not.

The narrative framing was interesting, which I really enjoyed, but I do have to say one thing. As a member of the LGBT community, it’s very tiresome. I think Taniguchi and Orihata are very cute, even if Orihata is clearly hiding something, but Anou really gets the short end of the stick. Anou has troubling behavior, and. There’s nothing wrong with LGBT characters being complicated and not always being morally pure, but there is a problem when the series’ only LGBT character does morally questionable things for the sake of love. Japan is a conservative country and has a lot to go in terms of LGBT rights and representation, but this feeling complicated the episode. Even if Boogiepop is filled with characters doing socially unacceptable things when your only LGBT character is doing strange things for love… it’s hard to not feel a little uncomfortable.

Anou does break free at the end, and fingers crossed as to whether he will still end up confessing but, it still feels sloppy. You can do better, Boogiepop.