Midnight Train

Due to unforeseen circumstances, yesterday’s review of Cop Craft episode 3 was pushed back to today. And, since Tuesdays are supposed to be Okaa-san Online episode review days, I’ll be pushing my review of that back until tomorrow.

With that out of the way, let’s get right into the part of the episode review where I admit that I was wrong about the series. And no, I’m not about to admit that this series actually isn’t good. I do think it’s slightly less good than previously, but that has nothing to do with what I wanted to admit here.

Last week I’m fairly sure I predicted that the terrorist organization was going to be the sub-antagonist while the drug cartel was going to be the main antagonist. I’m not going to go back to check what I said then, but I’m almost certain that’s the stance I had.

So for anyone who’s already seen this week’s episode, you’ll know that my original stance is likely incorrect. The leader of the drug cartel was killed by Tilarna, and the terrorist organization came to the forefront. I get that terrorists are a flashier antagonist group, but since this is a cop series I figured the drug cartel route would make more sense.

Tilarna Hits the Club

You may recall that Tilarna ran away at the end of the previous episode. I’m pretty sure she did this because she didn’t like the way in which the humans were handling the case. They simply didn’t view it as an urgent situation the same way Tilarna did, in part due to their ignorance.

To take matters into her own hands, she seeks out the help of the criminal Kei uses as an informant. She requires a fake ID and some clothes that will help her blend in with the crowd in a club owned by Dennis Elbaji, the leader of the alien drug cartel. Luckily she knows someone who can get those things, the criminal informant Kei uses.

It doesn’t take long for her to meet Dennis Elbaji himself, and the two go into his office where they can have a private conversation. Their conversation quickly takes a turn for the worse and a fight ensues. However, Tilarna left her sword behind with Kei when she ran away for some unknown reason.

Was she leaving her sword behind so that Kei would follow her? Or was it truly a mistake on her part? Considering how connected she is to that sword I have a hard time believing it was the latter. But at the same time, it’s not like she needed Kei’s help anyway, at least not if she had the sword to begin with.

Anyway, Kei does eventually show up with Tilarna’s sword and she uses it to kill Dennis Elbaji.

High Quality Animation

Let’s take a break from the summary format for a bit and discuss this fight between Tilarna and Dennis. Honestly there isn’t much about the fight itself to discuss. They both use swords because apparently aliens with swords are more effective than aliens with guns.

What really matters about this fight is the animation quality. I know the title of this section is “High Quality Animation,” so let me explicitly say that I was being facetious when I titled it that. The animation of this fight, and most of the episode afterwards, is terrible.

The majority of this fight is still frames or shots with extremely limited movement. Perhaps I didn’t notice that the animation was this bad in the first two episodes, but I really don’t think it was. This episode seems to have extra bad animation, and I’m worried the rest of the series will follow suit.

However, it wasn’t only the animation which seemed to tank. The art quality suffered as well. Don’t get me wrong, this series hasn’t ever looked amazing, but it looked pretty decent most of the time. Compare that to the shot of the Red Wizard and the chief towards the end and you’ll see a clear difference.

The character models look like they were supposed to be for background characters, but ended up front and center. It’s not good a good look when the most action-packed part of an episode is mostly still frames and the big twist is done with terrible artwork.

The Red Wizard

As you might expect if you’ve been reading my reviews for any amount of time, I don’t know what the Red Wizard’s actual name is. I know it starts with a Z, but since I can just refer to him as the Red Wizard, I’m not incentivized to go back and figure out what it was.

But his name doesn’t actually matter. What matters is what he’s done and what he plans to do. So let’s start off with what he plans to do because that’s been laid out pretty well so far. Basically he seems to be the mastermind behind both the terrorist and drug cartel organizations.

When we were first introduced to him he was playing the part of lackey to Dennis, but it’s pretty clear by now that this was only so he could use Dennis. He actually had an alliance with the police chief and has the distinct goal of destroying human-alien relations, whereas Dennis just wanted to make money.

And how does the Red Wizard plan to destroy human-alien relations? By working with humans to set of a psychic bomb so that the humans will realize they should actually fear the aliens rather than be friendly with them. Yeah, I don’t think this plot point is all that well thought out.

The second big reveal regarding the Red Wizard (the first was him teaming up with the chief) is that he’s actually someone from Kei’s past. He’s the man who slaughtered Kei’s entire unit during “the war,” which we can assume happened right after the gate appeared.

However, this plot point is a bit strange as well. Wouldn’t this have made a far bigger impression on Kei’s character than the loss of his partner in episode 1? You’d think this event would be why he didn’t trust Tilarna at first, but no. Maybe it was such a tragic event that Kei’s PTSD blocked it from his memory.

Conclusion

What did you think of this week’s episode of Cop Craft? Do you agree that the animation quality decreased in this episode? Do you think the plot is also beginning to falter? Let me know in the comments. If you don’t agree with me, let me know why as well.

If you enjoyed this review, be sure to click the like button ❤ down below. Also follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any upcoming content. I tweet out every time a new post goes live or the schedule changes, so it’s the best way to stay up to date.

Finally I’d like to thank HeavyROMAN for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of the next episode is available here.

Dragnet Mirage

This week’s episode of Cop Craft was titled “Dragnet Mirage,” though we were never actually told what that is or what it’s supposed to mean. However, I have two main guesses. Either Dragnet Mirage is another name for the Fairy dust drug, or it’s the name of the underground organization which produces it.

And while we don’t know what this organization’s goals are, we learned that they’re more than a standard drug cartel. I assume they’re the ones making and distributing the drugs, but they also make weapons out of them and sell those weapons to terrorist organizations.

I’ll get into these weapons and the drugs themselves later on, but for now I just want to say that I think the terrorist organization purchasing the weapons will only be a sub-antagonist. The main antagonists of the series are probably going to be the drug synthesizers and traffickers, who coincidentally aren’t human.

And I bring up the fact that the antagonists in this series aren’t human because I think that’s going to be a theme throughout the series. Kei somewhat distrusts Tilarna due to her race, and as the series progresses the two of them will slowly bond as his racist views fade away.

There’s probably going to be some sort of turning point for the pair as well once the learn the other-worlder drug traffickers are working with human terrorists. Something about how there’s good and bad in people of all races is my guess.

But Kei’s transformation isn’t the one I’m interested in. He seems like a pretty standard protagonist. He has optimistic ideals, but at the same time has seen enough to know how reality works. Tilarna isn’t the same. She’s the younger, less experienced of the two and I’m looking forward to her character growth.

Mildey

The other-worlders, or at least the race Tilarna is a member of (which I think last week I mentioned I would get the name of, but alas here we are), are able to use a form of magic. In the previous episode we saw Tilarna use it to power herself up in some way before charging into battle.

However, there seem to be many more uses for this magic than simply for physical buffs. Tilarna mentions that this magic system, known as mildey, isn’t all powerful as Kei probably believes it to be. But with that said, we don’t yet have a true understanding of how it works or what its limitations are.

When Tilarna used it, it was more of an invocation of the gods. But when one of the antagonists uses it, this isn’t the case. He’s able to control the “dead” with a simple flick of his finger, no incantation needed.

Unfortunately I don’t think the magic system in Cop Craft is ever actually going to be explained. Sure, magic in the form of mildey seems to be a fairly important aspect of the series, but I don’t think an understanding of that system is all that necessary for the story to make sense.

Also, has it been established how long the gate has been open for in this world? The various races seem to be mixed together pretty well, which I assume took some time, but the humans in the series seem to have trouble believing that magic exists.

If the fact that a gate to another world opening up wasn’t enough evidence, Kei even witnesses Tilarna use her magic to fight. And yet, he seems to dismiss the idea that magic is real when she attempts to use it to solve the crimes they’re investigating at first.

“Regular Users”

It seems that the humans and other-worlders have different understandings about the Fairy dust drugs. This is first seen when Kei refers to the deceased as “regular users” while Tilarna refers to them as “dead.” At face value, it would seem they’re referring to two different things, but are they?

We later learn that even those who are still “alive” are referred to as “dead” by the other-worlders once they come in contact with the drug. At this stage, however, it’s unclear whether they’re actually alive or dead. In all likeliness, they’re existing somewhere in between.

It should come as no surprise that the other-worlders have a better understanding of the drugs they create than the humans do. The humans see the Fairy dust almost as any other drug. People get addicted to it, commit crimes while on it, and occasionally die because of it.

It’s also important to note that even those who have only used the drug once are seen as “regular users” by the humans. This isn’t because using something one time makes someone a regular user, but probably more due to the fact that the humans simply can’t tell the difference between someone using it once or hundreds of times.

On the other hand we have the other-worlders who have a similar, yet opposite understanding. To them, using the drug only once is also the same as using it hundreds of times, but they refer to them as “dead.”

Is this because using the drug even once seals their fate? Is it because it turns them into mindless beings who are controllable? Or is it because it actually kills them after a single use and their bodies are simply being controlled after death?

Conclusion

So what did you think of this week’s episode of Cop Craft? Do you think the magic system is ever going to be explained? What do you think Dragnet Mirage is? And what are your thoughts about the “regular users?” Let me know in the comments.

If you enjoyed this episode review be sure to click the like button ❤ down below. Also follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any upcoming content. I tweet out every time a new post goes live, so it’s the best way to stay up to date.

Finally, I’d like to thank HeavyROMAN for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of the next episode is available here.

Cop Show, Witch Craft

Before the Summer season began, Cop Craft was actually my pick for hidden gem anime of the season. It seemed weird enough to be overlooked by most viewers, and yet original enough to be something worthwhile. And then, when I went to watch episode 1 today, I saw the MAL rating of it.

As of the moment I’m writing this review it has a 6.5/10. And if you know anything about how the general population of MAL rates things, that’s essentially a 2/10 in real people ratings. However, after I watched the episode for myself I noticed that the 6.5/10 rating was made up of only eight users.

I ended up giving this episode a 7, but seeing that MAL rating got me thinking, “is the 6.5/10 the true rating of this episode?” Surely the only people who have seen and rated it so far are those like myself who figured it was worth the watch and actually care enough to rate using the full 10-point system. And if so, I can accept that rating. But if it has the same score after a couple thousand users rate it, then there’s an issue.

Either way Cop Craft episode 1 isn’t quite the hidden gem I hoped it would be, but it definitely has potential. This may be a weird comparison, but I see it being kind of like a mix between Cowboy Bebop and Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens.

It has the more modern, crime setting of Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens, but still retains some of the crazier aspects of a series like Cowboy Bebop, or even FLCL. I could also see the comparison to Re:Creators, though I haven’t seen that one myself so I can’t comment too much on it.

Fairies and Wizards and Aliens, Oh My!

If you haven’t seen anything about Cop Craft before now, you may be wondering, “what is Cop Craft?” Well, dear reader, it’s a bit weird to explain. Think of it this way, at its core it’s a detective/crime series, but it also includes a lot of things out of this world. Literally.

I didn’t catch exactly where the series supposedly takes place, but my guess is some city in Japan in the near future. Human technology is essentially the same as it is for us now, but humans aren’t the only ones around. A mysterious gate has opened in the Pacific allowing alien races to come to our planet.

But unlike in an anime like GATE, the other-worlders in this series aren’t amassing armies to invade Earth. Instead the gate essentially functions as an international border. While humans don’t seem to enter it other than the military, the other-worlders are (somewhat) free to gain entry to Earth via this border.

We know this because the city our protagonist, Kei Matoba, lives in is full of different races not normally found on Earth. But, as with many borders, illegal entry to Earth is also possible through the gate. And this means that extra-terrestrial crime has made its way to Earth as well.

It should also be noted that while these other-worlders are referred to as aliens, they seem more like a combination of the aliens we know and love from classic sci-fi and more traditional fantasy races. In particular, we know that there are both evil wizards and fairies.

Unfortunately for the fairies, they seem to be traded on the black market to be ground up into drugs or something. I don’t know, maybe they use fairy sweat to make the drugs, but I liked the idea of drugs literally made out of fairies more.

Kei Matoba

As already mentioned, one of our two protagonists is a human named Kei Matoba. He’s a detective who loses his partner of four years right at the start of the episode. Spoiler by the way. His partner was killed by an other-worlder in a drug bust gone wrong.

It’s unclear exactly how he feels about the aliens, but we can assume that his partner being killed by one has left a bad taste in his mouth. Even so, he’s still somewhat accepting when he’s told that he’ll be working with an alien from the same race as the one who killed his former partner.

From this my assumption is that he’s not actually racist, but that he’ll have to learn to trust his new non-human companion as the series progresses. And as we learn from this first episode, he and his new partner have differing ways of getting things done.

Kei has been around the block a few times and knows how things work in his city. He knows which informants are trustworthy, how to put pressure on them, and when to look the other way if it keeps the information flowing. He may not like working this way, but it gets the job done.

Tilarna Exedilika

The other protagonist is an alien by the (shortened) name of Tilarna Exedilika. I don’t remember what her race is called, but I don’t think that really matters all that much right now. If it’s mentioned in a later episode I’ll be sure to take note of it.

Tilarna is a knight from her homeland and was sent to Earth to track down the fairy which was smuggled across the border at the beginning of the episode. To her people, that fairy is special for whatever reason. I’m pretty sure she mentioned why, but whatever.

Her ideals are also much more driven by right and wrong than Kei’s. While Kei is willing to use a small time criminal as an informant to catch the bigger fish, Tilarna simply sees a criminal as a criminal, no matter the scale.

And since she’s essentially a member of a fantasy race, obviously this means Tilarna uses a sword to meat out justice rather than a handgun. She also appears to be fairly proficient in magic since we see her casting some spell which calls upon the god of war before going into battle.

It’s unclear if that spell in particular caused this transformation, or if she simply did both in tandem, but her clothing also changes when she goes into “battle-mode.” Does that qualify her as an official magical girl?

Lastly, Tilarna is also a member of the elite of her race. She claims that her extremely long, formal name is a sign of this. The fact that she’s a knight is also probably a sign of her status. I hope we get to see more of Tilarna talking down to Kei the commoner.

Conclusion

Have you seen the first episode of Cop Craft yet? If so, what did you think? If not, were you even planning on watching it? And are you planning on watching it now that you know I — someone you respect highly — think it’s going to be good? Let me know in the comments.

If you enjoyed this review, be sure to click the like button ❤ down below. Also follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any future content. You can also interact with me over there if the comment section isn’t your thing.

Finally, I’d like to thank HeavyROMAN for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of the next episode is available here.