My body is ready.

Impression

Shake it now, baby now~

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I’m actually hyped. Is it wrong that I’m looking forward to this adaptation? If it’s wrong, then I don’t think I want to be right. I don’t know whether it’s because I came into this with absolutely zero expectations, or because I was able to pick up on all the subtle foreshadowing that you only come to understand after you play the entire visual novel, but I greatly enjoyed this hour-long first episode. Yes, even the fight between Kagari and Krivoy Rog, as surprising as that was to see. That giant thing doesn’t even appear in all but one of the routes, and given how upfront Tensho and 8bit were about this being an anime-original adaptation from start to finish, I can accept their decision to demonstrate Kagari’s offensive and defensive power in this way. It also served as a convenient method of introducing Pani and Gil, alongside the eerie closed space underneath the school that may or may not have something to do with Akane, so three birds with one stone I suppose.

Rewrite 1 Img094As you’re probably aware of by now, I did a series of posts covering the Rewrite visual novel exactly two years ago. And I repeatedly stressed during my coverage that an anime adaptation of Rewrite would be a terrible idea. I even made a separate post complaining about it when an adaptation was first announced last year. Who wouldn’t? Objectively, it is an extremely hard VN to adapt, let alone adapt well. So it’s with a bit of humble embarrassment that I admit to having liked this episode, although the fact that the adaptation as a whole faces a steep uphill climb has yet to change. It could all too easily go wrong at some point, and I can definitely see many people objecting to the scenes included in this episode alone. In fact, the general opinion on this adaptation will probably vary wildly – that will remain true regardless of whether you’ve read the VN or not, but especially so if that is the case. It’s perfectly watchable with no prior knowledge, but you understand a lot less as a result – for example, the likely reason Kotori was late for school, or odd things about Kotori’s mother and Kotarou’s physical abilities and his almost-unnaturally deep voice. And it’s not like the anime will go out of its way to eventually explain everything to you, because its aim from the very start was to adapt a sixth character route focusing on ‘that girl’ (which is very clearly Kagari, as much as I want her to be Nishikujou). It won’t tell the whole story because it was never intended to, in other words. By introducing enemies like Krivoy Rog without any warning, its target audience is very obviously fans of the VN. And for those who are unfamiliar with it, it’s supposed to be an introduction into hooking you into playing the VN, and suspiciously enough the airing of the anime coincides with the release of Rewrite+, which is a remastered version of the game with extra content.

Rewrite 1 Img023What I’ve also been very conscious of is the fact that my enjoyment of the episode mustn’t be equated with whether it had any objective quality or not. I was less impressed in that regard, especially in light of the terrible production values (complete with the dubious use of CG). It pulled itself together for several important scenes, but by and large the animation really wasn’t great. It can only be said to have done well within its self-imposed restraints, that is, in the context of its one-cour time limit and the absolutely liability that is 8bit. I’m not sure how many episodes a good adaptation of the common route plus a Kagari route would need, but I initially felt it all but signed its own death warrant when it was announced that it had merely 13 episodes to work with. I’m now a little more optimistic given that the slice-of-life facade has quickly been stripped away to reveal the true supernatural plot line lurking underneath, but I still want to proceed with caution. My envisaged plan for a full adaptation would have had no more than 5-6 episodes for each character route, so 13 for the common route and Kagari should be feasible. Hopefully.

So what is Rewrite about? To help with that, I recently found something fun that I thought I’d share – it’s a hilariously spoiler-tastic summary of the entire game that originated from certain unmentionable origins. It’s technically all correct, and as a result it spoils practically everything in the most spiteful way possible, such that if you read it you don’t even know you’ve been spoiled unless you understand exactly what you’re reading. My sides hurt from laughing by the time I got to the end. So don’t read this if you intend to play the game afterwards. If you don’t really care, go ahead and click. It’s 100% true.

[spoiler] Rewrite tells the story of Kazamatsuri Bond, a 27 year old agent of U.N. Special Ops (UNSO). Bond was an edgy kid, he liked to kill bratty young girls’ parents in front of them. He fought the terrorists of the Greenpeace conglomerate with every drop of his blood, no matter how many dinosaurs they had. Both factions were fighting over a nuclear device called the Lock, which could destroy the world. During one such battle Bond was defeated, and put into a coma because of the nuclear device.

Now at age 27, after waking from his coma, Bond decided fuck it and to enter school again, because he still looked like he was 17 from nuclear radiation. Well he actually has amnesia as a side effect, but he just wants to live it up at school like he never got to. He wanted to get a girlfriend, mess with his best friend, join a club, become a TV reporter and grope some girl’s tits. To get all of this, he joined a club where he reported on paranormal stuff with the other members.

Little did Bond know, the members were all undercover agents of UNSO and Terrorist Greenpeace! His childhood friend, also turned out to be the girl whose parents he killed. Apparently she resurrected them into plant zombies, because she’s a magical sage. One friend is a UNSO top agent, one friend has a servant who is Bond’s alternate universe self, one friend is literally worse than Hitler, and one friend is a walking biohazard.

If that wasn’t enough, the Lock turned up again, starting another war. The device is actually a cute deadpan girl, with an obsession for Bond. She sneaks into his bed at night and haunts him. To top it all off, Bond’s blood is now nuclear residue which he can shape at will!

Now Bond must choose a side, but no matter what happens, the Earth is fucked either way. Unless of course he can become a tree, build a canoe with his wood, fly it to the moon and terraform it. That would solve everything.

Written by Romeo Tanaka.

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[/spoiler]

Rewrite 1 Img048If you chose not to open that, all you can probably understand right now is that this story has Tennouji Kotarou as its main character, a sociable and physically gifted high school student who hangs out with his childhood friend Kotori, exchanges banter with his classmate Yoshino and is currently being haunted by a cute ghost girl who I’m going to tell you now is named Kagari, because there’s no point hiding it and I also wouldn’t know how to refer to her otherwise. Beyond that, the primary emotion must be confusion, right? And maybe a little surprise, since many works created by Key usually start off with a high concentration of slice-of-life before slowly having the supernatural aspects to the story gradually filter in. If you’re like me and have a love for all cute things, you must have also found Kagari extremely cute, which oddly I also did. I say oddly because I really don’t remember her being this adorable biting on Kotarou’s arm in the VN – although that might be because we only ever get these events from his perspective in the game and he was constantly scared out of his wits back then. The anime also increased the frequency of her appearances by quite a lot, including a cute anime-original one where Kotarou unwittingly gives her a can of Key-branded coffee (heh) which reminded me a lot of the ‘Three Cups of Coffee’ scene in Moon, which I really loved. If you don’t understand, don’t worry. As ever, there are small bits of foreshadowing you can pick up on – there is a specific reason Kagari always chooses his arm to bite on and not anywhere else on his body, for example.

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Rewrite 1 Img076For me, my primary emotion was nostalgia. I know it’s only been two years since I finished the VN (my memory is also slightly fuzzy as a result, so I may get things wrong on occasion) but it feels like it’s been forever. No matter how bad the animation quality was, I couldn’t help smiling and whistling along whenever a soundtrack I recognised came up – which was pretty much all of them. Soft Windflower and Daisy are both really good, and of course the TV version of Philosophyz got me all hyped up. It’s the first Key adaptation I’m getting to experience while not having previously been a secondary, and the feeling of recalling all the settings and great scenes (from the park in Kazamatsuri to the Martel Group HQ and the endless hallway in the school) is amazing. Hearing Kotarou speak is weird though, as all his lines were silent in the game except for during Terra, the ‘true’ route (sort of like what Refrain was to Little Busters and After Story was to Clannad). I liked how he tends to talk to himself a lot, or say things in his head even when around other people – many VN adaptations fail to include the many important monologues the main character makes, and this loss during transition is a major weakness that really dilutes many series. So constant narration by Kotarou is a good thing. A very good thing in particular for Rewrite, as it’s important to understand his motives, point of view and personality as the story progresses not least of all because he changes so dramatically as a person in different ways depending on the story route you choose to lead him down.

Rewrite 1 Img014Who else was really surprised that they actually started with Moon?! For those who don’t know, the anime started off with a scene from the Moon route, a very confusing acid trip ‘prelude’ to the true route Terra. I still don’t fully understand it even today, but I sure as hell could recognise it at a glance. Starting and returning to various sections of Moon was, I think, generally accepted to be the best way of handling a multi-route adaptation of the VN, but I never imagined they’d actually do it! And it was such a faithful adaptation too, with so many lines like ‘my body feels extremely light’ or ‘the deserted city stimulates my boyish sense of adventure’ that I remember. And the hill of daisies! And Kagari’s incomprehensible speech! I won’t say any more as so much of the route is a massive spoiler if you know exactly what you’re looking at, but it would be really, really wonderful if they showed a little bit of Moon at the start of each episode – a bit like how the broken robot in Clannad made repeated appearances despite not seemingly being related to the story until the very end. In fact, the entire opening montage was totally unexpected, as well as being very spoiler-heavy. The cut of Shizuru in particular in a white summer dress leaning back on a certain tree rekindled all sorts of feels. That was one of the best scenes in the entire game.

Rewrite 1 Img101I think the general approach to this first premiere was to introduce all the main heroines and several important side characters while setting up a backdrop for the supernatural plot of the show that will later properly reveal itself. If you’d progressed an equivalent amount in the VN, getting up to the point where Kotarou meets Akane, the story would have still appeared as a normal school slice-of-life comedy – so it looks like Romeo and Tensho are aiming to accelerate things a bit to retain interest and progress with the plot. I really love Akane by the way. Kagari is cute, and Kotori is super soft and cuddly, but if you’ve read my VN coverage you’ll know that I gave my heart to Akane a long time ago. I almost felt like I could die happy when she gave an even sexier rendition of the ‘welcome gypsy’ line than she did in the game. I don’t know whether they re-dub lines for adaptations in general – they probably do, some scenes must have to be rearranged or otherwise edited. But that’s great for me, I get to hear more of Akane-sama’s wonderful sexy voice. I’m hopeful that someone at 8bit really likes her too, since the key frame for the occult club room is actually drawn in surprisingly good detail. It was one of the most beautifully-drawn scenes of the episode. Whether or not she had anything to do with Kotarou’s accidental adventure in the closed space they kind of left up to our imagination, although Akane most likely just wanted to fuck with him, really. She’s harmless, I promise. Kind of.

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Rewrite 1 Img073Other highlights included a surprise appearance by Chibimoth (the ‘mammoth’), every single Yoshino scene, every single Kotori scene, the famous bicycle scene with Chihaya and a proper design for Inoue at last! A strange roaring dinosaur and Kotarou getting his limbs torn off by Kagari while wearing a suit was also really unexpected for them to include in the very first episode, although if nothing else all this late-game material gives me a bit of comfort that 8bit won’t be ignoring Moon and Terra. Actually, it’s kind of impossible to, given that their aim is to create a Kagari route after all. What really, really pleased me was the emphasis they gave to what I’ve taken to calling the question – the ‘Key’ question (see what I did there) that every single route in the game revolves around:

You have power, and are discontent with this world. Tell me, do you wish to change this world? Or do you wish to change yourself?

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Whether Kotarou chooses himself, the world or refuses to choose will essentially decide the character route he eventually goes down in the game. So this is absolutely vital. It’s a major ideological decision that will influence Kotarou’s personality and actions in the episodes to come, and if there’s anything you’re going to take away from reading this post as an anime-only viewer I want to stress that this is really important. Which one would you go for? It’s actually a great bit of directing to have Tensho deliberately not reveal the choice Kotarou ended up picking. It’s almost as if, unlike with Grisaia, he actually played the game this time before making an anime out of it! Or did so much of the episode go right because of Romeo’s influence? He’s the script writer for the adaptation, after all.

I should probably stop now, this post is getting far too long. I might have just gotten myself lost in the nostalgia, but despite having protested quite vocally at the existence of a Rewrite anime I think this could actually work. It could be much better, I’m not going to deny that – the best case scenario would be a full-length adaptation of every single route, because Rewrite deserves nothing less. And the animation is objectively shit. But other than that, for a so-called anime-only Kagari route, I really do think they pulled off the first episode surprisingly well. I’m obviously going to blog this (as this is a sixth character route it feels to me more like finishing something I started a few years ago) but I’ll be doing so with a much more optimistic outlook than I had before. Maybe, just maybe, the glass is now half-full instead of half-empty.

Possibility of Watching: Guaranteed
Possibility of Blogging: Guaranteed

This Post Has 12 Comments

  1. Shiki

    I was pretty surprised and confused to see the first scenes of the moon route and kagari everywhere but than i remembered that its the kagari route now (oh and random chibimoth and he is not surprised to see a mammoth xD) . Also I was so happy hearing all those nostalgic voices again and I was literally screaming and fangirling when they were showing kotori at the tree, the chihaya tree and bike scene, lucias grrrrrrr and little shizuru (also made me remember how much I cried at the end of her route) oh and not to mention Inoues design from Rewrite HF. It felt kinda odd seeing kotoris mother there considering we only get to actually see her at the end as well. But overall it was pure nostalgia and it must have been extremly confusing for those that didn’t play the VN as there were so many things happening without explanation like why those monsters and the other dimension and why he is talking about superpower but not telling that he has the rewrite power (which is probably coming next ep or so).
    I really hope the anime is keeping this up or even gets better considering how original stories tend to run their heads against a wall by the end (kabaneri and mayoiga for example)

    1. Vantage

      It’s definitely catered towards those who have read the VN – after adapting the common route it’ll go into a sixth route, and so it would make sense if it was designed to be experienced after you’ve played through the other five character routes. Just one of them won’t reveal the whole story (e.g. Kotori’s route veered off into a different direction from the others) so there’s no reason to expect the anime to either. And you only come to understand why a sixth route is possible and where it all fits in to the wider narrative of the game after Moon and Terra. It’ll end up a bit like the Kancolle anime in that you can derive enjoyment from it, but not as much as if you were familiar with the source material.

      Chibimoth was cute! CUTE! What I loved about Kotori sleeping and the bike scene was that they were familiar CG images, it’s really nice to see them all faithfully adapted into the anime. Akane’s crystal ball and Yoshino glaring as he looked up at Kotarou were both recognisable as well. Even certain scenes like Yoshino talking to Kotarou in the hallway felt like I was watching an animated version of their sprites from the game.

      Tanaka Romeo is writing the Kagari route, so I’m just going to hope he can come up with something interesting that ties in well with the other routes. Kabaneri should never have introduced Biba, and Okada just gave up on Mayoiga at around the halfway point. At least Kiznaiver was good, right?

  2. I.D. nameless

    That was a long post. I hope you can forgive me for skimming through the last part.
    Anyway, I also liked this episode, except the fight left me confused. Is Kagari really strong ebough that she can handle Krivoy Rog just like that? That would make her almost as strong as Sakuya and I’m not sure I like that.
    Also, a lot of this brought out a horror atmosphere that I did not feel in the VN. I always found Kotarou being stalked by Kagari as funny and light-hearted (I guess Akane making fun of the situation and the longer stretches of SOL in between did not help). Instead, here I felt a chill down my spine.
    “it’s a hilariously spoiler-tastic summary of the entire game that originated from certain unmentionable origins.” I knew exactly what you’re talking about when I read that :))

    1. Vantage

      Don’t worry, I just felt like I had so much I wanted to say!

      I don’t think Kagari’s power level was ever properly established, so maybe that’s what Romeo was trying to do here. It was weird seeing her turn up in the school’s closed space at all, actually. Even when she was about to get crushed by Krivoy Rog I just thought her automatic defence would save her, and Kotarou would use that time to rewrite himself and flee.

      The different atmosphere might be because Kagari was practically everywhere this episode, while in the VN I only remember her appearing sporadically and even then mostly in his room (at least as far as early-game is concerned). There was that one time when she appeared somewhere in the town, but she’s never been so proactive as to stalk him all the way to school and drink his coffee. I’ve never seen her as waifu material, especially in light of her identity and since Terra wasn’t really romantic, but she was cute this time. If I woke up to her biting my arm in the middle of the night I’d probably hug her and go back to sleep.

      I wouldn’t mind seeing Kotarou go full Kazamatsuri Bond. It’s a Kagari route after all, a happy ending is all but impossible :^)

      1. elior1

        i think 13 episodes will be enough since i can see them doing a bit of the common route and then go to the original kagari route for the rest of the episodes

        1. Vantage

          I hope so too. As I said in the rant post, my initial vision was to have two-cours covering the common route, Kotori, Chihaya and Lucia’s routes. That would mean an average of 6 episodes for each, which would make a 13-episode season with just the common route and Kagari work perfectly. The common route might even be a little shorter given how eager they seem to focus on the supernatural, so either that means more Kagari route or repeated dreams telling the story of the Moon route. I do wonder where it’ll fit into Rewrite+ when that comes out at the end of July.

          Also hoping for a Moon + Terra second season if this sells well, that might be pushing it though!

  3. irene

    it seems cool.

    1. Vantage

      It is cool! You’re better off playing through the VN first however, it’ll enable you to appreciate and understand the anime so much more.

  4. nanaya

    Glad to another fan that isn’t nitpicking every little thing.

    For me, I am really looking forward to the consequences of that fight (One of Midou’s pal is dead right?). How would Gaia respond? Would they find out about ‘Key’? Would the infighting between them increase? Would there be a full blown war with Guardian? How would Koutarou react to Kagari’s nightly biting session now? Would the current common route is even going to lead up to events in Nov 13?

    Also if they do this right rewrite is going to be one of those show that have great re-watch value for anime-only, the amount of little things and foreshadowing they put in the episode one is quite a lot.

    1. Vantage

      I genuinely believed that this would be irredeemably shit, you see. So the choice to start with Moon was already pleasantly beyond my expectations, and I thought they pulled off many of the scenes really well.

      That’s really interesting, I hadn’t thought about the consequences. The dude who controls Krivoy Rog shouldn’t be dead… I think? I don’t know the extent to which it can move autonomously – if it died quickly enough it shouldn’t have overdrafted its summoner’s life force to re-heal. Gaia must be pissed. Akane might get some flak from Suzaki and them lot. I don’t think they’d suspect Guardian though – who in Guardian could even do that? I’m not sure what Esaka’s power level is as one of the strongest superhumans, and Kotarou beat him (albeit he got lucky, and it was relatively nearer to the end of the route). Kotarou couldn’t do shit to Krivoy Rog. When I think of entities that could kill it, I think of Sakuya or the Earth Dragon and both are Terrorist Greenpeace affiliated anyway. Which means I guess they might suspect the Key?

      Kotarou seemed scared of Kagari before, but not scared enough to leave her to die. Maybe they’ll talk, assuming this Kagari isn’t practically mute like she was in Chihaya’s route. All she’s said is ‘Kotori’ so far, and I don’t know whether Kotarou even has ‘good memories’ with her, or whether they’re good enough.

      As for changes to the common route, I’m not sure of that either. I want the toxic waste river scene with Kotori though (with Black Star Sickness playing) and the Leaf Dragon fight. One of the really good things about the common route was that the abundance of slice-of-life lulled you into a false sense of security which you were harshly woken up from when all the shit started happening. We won’t get that with the anime as there’s just not enough time.

      1. I.D. nameless

        I’m a bit pessimistic on seeing the leaf dragon now unfortunately. It was such a powerful moment in the VN that stuck with me. Now fucking Krivoy Rog is already dead and I’m sure that would take away from the impact of the LD since Kotarou’s already seen much worse. Still, I’m not completely down on it, they might make it work one way or another. Also, I think you’re understimating Esaka a little. He was completely owning Kotarou in that one fight, Kotarou won because he was lucky to not reveal his power to him before. And even if Esaka alone could not do it, they could still suspect a group of guardians, not just one of them. The work in teams usually.

        1. Vantage

          That’s the thing. The relative normalcy of Kotarou’s peaceful school life was supposed to be well and truly ruined by the Leaf Dragon. My memory is a little fuzzy, but I think it was only after that venture into the forest and the encounter with the Leaf Dragon (or was it the black dog familiars?) that the occult club began to fall apart as everyone found out about their conflicting allegiances and we slowly shifted from the common route into one of the character routes.

          Oh of course, Guardian usually work in teams of superhumans. How could I have forgotten! Akane will definitely have her suspicions after what Kotarou told her in Episode 2, although I don’t think even she will suspect that Kotarou has ties to Guardian (and for all intents and purposes, the current him genuinely doesn’t have any).

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