A nuclear disaster of epic proportions. The outcasts that live in the irradiated exclusion zone. Thick kansai-ben. An adventure in the ruins of an iconic city. A meditation on the Japanese condition so loud and dumb even a foreigner can understand it. A villain with loose socks.

Sometimes, a passable anime continually returns to my mind because it happens to push the right buttons. Originally from an '08 manga, the story took on an accidental prescience after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi Reactor meltdown. Coppelion, however, is obviously fashioned after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster which I hope needs little introduction. Its subsequent exclusion zone is an accidental nature preserve; a couple hundred elderly still live there illegally. The abandoned city of Pripyat is a symbol of the downfall of a utopian ideal. It holds a very special place in the popular imagination.

Coppelion paints Tokyo in these postnuclear colors. Short-lived, genetically engineered teens in school uniforms are dropped into the zone for a mission of no return: to find and evacuate the last holdouts who roam the city like ghosts. With their superhuman resistance, they pierce the swirling, radioactive fog and discover the secrets of the zone and the “Coppelion” units that preceded them.

The series is nothing if not a thermonuclear warhead of explosive pathos. The joshikousei angels continually descend on the haggard old men of the wasteland, offering hope in a world of despair. The old men prostrate themselves at the feet of the young Coppelions, begging forgiveness for the ruination they’ve inherited. I sense something of an allegory.

The pot of hope & despair churns constantly. A woman prepares to give birth in the zone; a symbol of rejuvenation in a dead world. Meanwhile, her husband joins an ex-military death cult that seeks to further the spread of the nuclear fallout, aided by renegade Coppelions who’ve lost their way. Meanwhile, figures involved in the original catastrophe seek redemption by joining the good guys. Meanwhile…

People may find this roller coaster ride of anime catharsis blunt and shallow despite the Chernobyl trappings, but the trappings are oh so interesting. A “twenty years later” version of the big city with its rust, overgrowth, shattered windows and teetering skyscrapers provides visual interest. The love-it-or-hate-it, prismatic “GoHands colors” accidentally works in an adventure through an irradiated wasteland. And the Osakan studio does deliver the occasional over-the-top action setpiece. What it lacks isn’t flavor. Flavoring may be the only thing it has.

Postscript: I originally wrote this review in 2020 as part of my Passable Anime that Comes to My Mind A Lot series. If you're looking for a good post-apocalypse mystery-adventure series, I highly recommend 2023's Heavenly Delusion (Tengoku Daimakyou) over this one.