English Dub Review: Boogiepop and Others “Vs Initiator 1”

The next monster.

Overview:

Initiator appears opposed to Boogiepop, and starts spreading her influence.

Our Take:

Although Manticore has been vanquished, there’s another monster out that Boogiepop is hunting, the mysterious Initiator. Even though we open with Initiator committing suicide, her influence still travels even after her death, latching onto those who are sleeping, and most importantly, those who are lacking something in their lives. She is also able to possess people, even those who seem alright with their lives, so she is likely some sort of corporeal presence as opposed to a proper being.

Initiator is interested in creating people to be aligned with her before she perishes, and the person she chooses this time is the school’s guidance counselor, Jin Asukai. Asukai has always been able to see into people’s hearts, see their growths and troubles in the form of roots that grow into thorns and a flower. Since he’s able to see how these thorns have latched onto a person, he is properly able to assess people’s problems and uses these skills to excel at his job.

Asukai is also extremely dissatisfied with his life, even if he doesn’t show it. He wants to help people, but he’s not able to always do so- as shown by him meeting his former student, who since became addicted to drugs. He can help people, but that’s not a certainty, and so that’s great dissatisfaction in his life. This dissatisfaction allows Initiator to find him, and seek him out, offering him power.

Initiator’s power that she offers Asukai is the ability to see his true potential; namely that he can attack the visuals that he sees. Although it’s unclear at the moment, it seems like he can trim people’s ‘buds’ namely, their desires and wants. In doing so, he can make people better, but if the bud is cut, it will render them catatonic. He tries this out on a gang of boys who are harassing a young couple, and that turns them into unmoving, unspeaking people. If used wrong, this could be devastating.

Now that a full arc is done, I can safely say that Boogiepop is a pretty weird show. Like I said last time, I like it, it has this slow introspective mood that’s really good, and it’s more concerned with people who don’t fit in even if they fit in socially, and how that headspace works. It definitely isn’t for everyone, but I can see the appeal.