English Dub Review: Wandering Witch – The Journey of Elaina “The Wall Etched by Travelers; The Grape-Stomping Girl”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

In the first vignette, Elaine remembers a story about how Nike convinced the officials of two villages to begin scribbling on their respective sides of the wall that they made to divide their country long ago. In the present, Saya arrives and then further convinces those officials to let their villagers start scribbling things too. However, the passionate messages that are first scribbled turn out to be major regrets for the villagers on both sides, forcing them to chip away at the wall until they just decide to tear it all down by the time Elaine gets there.

In the second, Elaine reaches another village that is also divided, but one side is getting much more business for having a reputation for having Rosemary, a beautiful woman, stomping on their wine grapes. The chief of the other side employs Elaine with stomping on grapes for them, but they soon find out that Rosemary’s grapes were stomped on by a punch of beefy men, causing an outrage. In the chaos, Elaine gets drunk off wine (apparently for the first time) and causes a bunch of grapes to fly everywhere, then escaping. In the aftermath, the chief and Rosemary apparently get married and tell the story of the events to their grandchildren.

OUR TAKE

In my binge of the first six episodes to get ready for this review, the major comparison that came to mind in regards to this show as Kino’s Journey, which is similar to this in that it is about a girl travelling everywhere in little morality play stories, though that had a much subtler fantasy element and less recurring characters. Not that being more overtly fantastical or having recurring characters make this show any better or worse, but it is a notable difference. And much like the previous six episodes, this one provides a couple stories that feel like they could very well be children’s fairy tales that have their own nuanced messages which fit neatly into ten to twenty minutes. I have a lot of respect for stories that can still competently make a good fairy tale story, especially if they can do it for multiple weeks in a row.

However, while I do think the first half of this series has handled this format successfully for the most part so far, this episode seems to have tripped and run into a wall on that. The message across the two stories about uniting two peoples who have been divided for foolish reasons is a noble one, and especially topical right now when my country in particular is so divided amongst itself, so the first vignette communicates this well enough. My issue comes with the second one and how it seems to lean heavily on literally fetishizing women stomping on grapes. Like for real, the fetish part is given a lot of attention, mostly to its detriment. Up until now, the stories have managed to keep things pretty family friendly in terms of approach to the plots, even in the case of the mad princess killing her father who turned into a dragon. But this, this is just weird.

This is by no means a bad episode by this show’s standards, but it does feel like a significant step down. Though for all I know, this may just not be to my taste. Anime has an odd habit of throwing in fetishes into what you would normally assume to be family friendly stories, usually just because the director wanted to. And I am by no means throwing judgement on any foot fetishist who may enjoy this episode, though even this is kinda tame for that. And I have to keep in mind the cultural differences that may better determine this sort of thing being made. Perhaps next episode will be better to my tastes, assuming I’m covering it.