Anime Review: "World Destruction"

I actually finished watching "World Destruction" several weeks ago, but I wanted some time to sit and think on it before I actually posted my impressions of this series. Before anything else, I should start with a little bit of background on the series. "World Destruction" is actually based on a new RPG Sega developed for the Nintendo DS by the same name and they commissioned Production I.G., who had done work during the game's development, to create a 13 episode series to air on TV prior to the game's release to help build up buzz for the game. In addition to the anime adaptation, I believe there was a manga spinoff running around the same time as well and the game itself came out in mid September of this year. In that watching a couple episodes of the anime and hearing about the game made me curious to dig up more information, I suppose the anime succeeded in its publicity goal (and unfortunately as interested as I am, the game has no current American release date), but how does it succeed as an entertaining, stand alone show?

The basic premise of the show (and the game) is that contrary to the standard RPG trope of a ragtag group fighting to save the world from destruction and doom, the protagonists of "World Destruction" seek to cause that same destruction and doom. In this alternate world, the oceans are apparently made of sand, and humans live as a race of second class citizens under the firm boot of the beastmen, a catch all term for a variety of anthropomorphic animal species. Named the World Destruction Committee, Kyrie Ilnis, Morte Asherah, and Toppi the mini-bear travel across the world, eluding the World Savior Committee and trying to unlock the secrets of the Destruct Code, which has the power to turn the world into an ocean of sand. Although really, Morte is the only one who really wants to destroy the world. Kyrie starts the series as a human masquerading as a beastman by wearing cat ears so that he can make a decent living as a waiter. Toppi, who looks like a yellow teddy bear with a bandana and an eyepatch, is a Hero, travelling the country in his quest to find wrongs to right. Through a series of events the three kind of get thrown together, Toppi and Kyrie are labeled as Morte's accomplices and must flee as fugitives, and Kyrie is implied to have some kind of connection with the Destruct Code.

So ends the summary, now begins the critique. The initial premise of having the "heroes" be the bad guys trying to destroy the world doesn't add as much variety as you might think. The show is highly formulaic and despite their "evil" goal, the group finds someone in trouble and helps them, human and beastman, before being chased off again by the World Savior Committee. In fact, nearly every episode follows this pattern and very little effort or time is spent explaining the Destruct Code or the characters. Morte is the driving force behind the group, but all you find out is that her brother died fighting against the beastmen, and now she just wants to destroy the world in her grief. But even that doesn't come up often; mostly, she's just kind of surly. Kyrie is absolutely useless, his most valuable contribution seems to be providing cat ears for Morte so they can enter town with less notice since his only skill in combat seems to be running away. If you wanted to get the "story" of the series, you only would really need to watch the first one or two episodes, and then the last three or so. Everything else is just filler. And even then, the big plot reveal of the series is fairly self evident to anyone who has played an RPG or watched some fantasy anime sometime recently. On the one hand I understand not wanting to give away too much of the game's story in what is basically a glorified commercial for it, but I really hope that the central plotline of the game is much deeper and more sophisticated, especially in light of its pedigree.

The show itself is made up of fairly bright colors, like most of its cousins, and the character designs are cute though perhaps not terribly unique. The animation quality is above average for most of the series, which I would expect coming from Production I.G. Music is unobtrusive and suits the series fairly well in terms of setting the mood and accompanying the action, but it's not particularly memorable. In case you haven't noticed in some of my previous reviews, the bulk of my attention tends to fall on areas of characters, plot, and premise as opposed to the more technical aspects of a show like animation quality, character design, or music, and there's a very good reason for that. I can dissect a story and point out what I perceive to be strengths and weaknesses much more easily than I can do the same for animation and music. Honestly, when it comes to those areas I can give general descriptions of things that I enjoyed or didn't like, or give very specific examples, but they don't stay in my memory as well or as long as the story aspects. Just an FYI.

So final judgment: I enjoyed watching "World Destruction" and I appreciate it calling my attention to a promising RPG that I may have otherwise never heard of (and might never get to play), but due to its repetitive and generic plotting and just above average technical execution, it's not a show that I can recommend to everyone.