It feels like Mappa has become the most hated high-profile anime studio in recent years. Between their exploitative work practices and their tendency to gobble up every high-profile shonen they can get their hands on, I get the sense that most people are just tired of talking about them- and their equally noxious fandom- as anything more than a representation of everything wrong with the current anime landscape. But there was a time, dear zoomers, before Mappa lost its way. There was a time when it was known not for being an endless grist mill, but as a factory for the most exciting, revolutionary anime on the market. Kids on the Slope, Terror in Resonance, Yuri on Ice, Dororo, Banana Fish, Sarazanmai... from bold, transformative manga adaptations to original series from the most talented creatives in the business, Mappa's output was unique and audacious and like nothing else in the medium. And while it was often far too ambitious for its own good- some things never change, sadly- that spirit of undaunted risk-taking is what everyone in this medium should aspire towards.

All this is to say, Zenshu is the most Old Mappa show that Mappa's made in at least half a decade, and I couldn't be more thankful for it

It's also one of the most frustrating series to talk about, as it feels like everyone wrote this off long before it released. Not because of anything in the show itself, but because the advertising made people jump to conclusions about it that weren't actually true. "Lol, Mappa's making a show about an animator dying from overwork? Tone deaf much?" And it pisses me off because it feels like so many people completely dismissed Zenshu based on something that isn't even a little bit true. Genius animator Hirose Natsuko isn't done in by overwork, but by a rotten clam lunch. And her story isn't focused on the plight of modern anime working conditions at all. Not that Mappa shouldn't be criticized for its godawful work practices, but that's just not the territory Zenshu is exploring, and it doesn't deserve to be raked over the coals for having different goals than Shirobako.

It also, frankly, doesn't really deserve the "isekai" label either. At least, not in the modern sense. Yes, Natsuko's death takes her into a fantasy world where she's granted special powers, but there's nary a Dragon Quest reference or stat screen to be found. Rather, this is much more in the realm of classic 90s portal fantasy: think Inyuasha, Escaflowne, Magic Knight Rayearth. Shows where the magical world the protagonist is transported to is a richly detailed and unique fantasy setting, and where the focus isn't on harem-building or stat-grinding, but on the main heroine's personal journey as she overcomes the demons that plagued her in the real world through her trials in the fantasy world. It's a show brimming with nostalgia for the shoujo-tinged days of this genre's past; and in fact, it soon becomes clear that Zenshu is a love letter to all of anime's past, and to the very power of storytelling itself.

You see, Natsuko isn't just transported to any old fantasy world by her run-in with week-old clams. Instead, she finds herself in the world of A Tale of Perishing, the movie that inspired her to become an animator when she saw it as a kid. It's a bizarre, aesthetically jumbled mishmash of fantasy tropes in which the world is endangered by monsters called Voids, seeking to destroy a mystical gem known as the Soul Future which is protected by humanity's last remaining city. Eight other Soul Futures have already been shattered; if this one goes too, the world ends. Humanity's fate rests in the hands of the Nine Soldiers, an elite band of heroes led by the dashing-but-immature Luke Braveheart, which also includes an elf archer, a shit-talking plush unicorn, and an Aztec-inspired living computer. And if you're wondering what happened to the other five, well... let's just say A Tale of Perishing is not the happiest of movies, and Natsuko's arrival marks a chance to change this world's tragic fate.

It may sound like I'm being blase about that tragedy, but I think that's the intended takeaway, at least at first. Something that becomes clear through the early parts of the show is that the movie A Tale of Perishing that Natsuko loves so much is, well... bad. Really bad. Most of the characters are cardboard archetypes, the plot derails for the sake of the most distressed damsel to ever be damseled in distress, and one of the main characters turns traitor and tries to destroy the world and it's never explained why. No, I'm not joking. Natsuko even makes a point to mention that not even the supplementary materials and side novels explain why. It's no wonder it ended up such a flop in Natsuko's world. But she saw it at just the right time, and flaws and all, it lit a fire under her that led her to pursue animation with a passion that drove out all other interests... and most other people as well. By the time we meet her in the present, she's grown into a control freak who tries to do tackle everything in the production by herself. And if you know anything about animation, you can probably guess the kind of strain that had on her before reincarnation gave her a chance to perform fix-it fanfic on the story that started it all for her.

And it's here that Zenshu reveals the true reason for its inception: Natsuko's special power is the power to summon legendary animation techniques. To fight the approaching Void swarms and give A Tale of Perishing a happy ending, she's granted a magic peg bar that allows her to summon whatever she draws into the world as weapons to save the day. And she uses that power to call forth the most iconic, influential bits of animation throughout anime's history, from Nausiccaa's legendary God-Warrior to a full-on Itano Circus that was guest-storyboarded by the very man who gave his name to that particular technique of animating missile barrages flying across the sky. All of which are rendered in gorgeous sketchy line art, like watching the unfinished storyboards on an animator's drawing sheet spring to life, notations and all. It's absolutely stunning, and if you're any kind of anime history buff you're gonna have so much fun picking out all the references.

But this isn't just nostalgia for nostalgia's sake; all this history knowledge and 90s-fantasy throwback vibes are crucial to understand Natsuko as a character. She's someone who's become disconnected from the reasons she fell in love with anime in the first place, crushed by her own self-imposed perfectionism and unwillingness to compromise on her vision. Like so many hardcore otaku, she's trapped in her own narrow world, unable to connect with the people around her and lacking the real world experience necessary to communicate something meaningful with her own art. But now, thrust into the retro-styled world of the movie that first inspired her, fighting back against monsters that represent despair using the techniques that have inspired countless animators throughout the years? Now, at last, she has a chance to get out of her head and remember why she chose this path in life. By reconnecting with her past, and with anime's past as a whole, she might just be able to grow out of her self-absorbed attitude and become a creator capable of connecting her art with the world around her and the people within it. Provided, of course, she can change this world's fate before it follows the movie to its nihilistic conclusion.

What's disappointing, sadly, is it feels like Zenshu doesn't ultimately take any of these ideas as far as it could. Moment to moment, it's immensely fun to watch, with gorgeous animation and world design whether it's a pitched battle or just the characters hanging out. But when I look back on it as a whole, it doesn't feel like any of these rich thematic threads really amounted to much beyond "Yeah, that's a thing that exists." There's a twist with A Tale of Perishing's original creator that just sort of exists, there's a dark reveal about the nature of Natsuko's powers that also just sort of exists, there are questions raised about the nature of this fictional world and whether or not it's responsible to try and "fix" a work of art that's already been completed, but in the end those questions, well, just sort of exist. And as a result, an ending that should feel world-shaking lands with a weak sort of "eh." I'm the easiest lay for art about art and stories about stories, but I really found myself struggling to care all that much about where Natsuko's journey was headed or what lessons she was supposed to learn when all was said and done.

How could this be fixed? I don't know. But what Zenshu really needed, in my opinion, was an editor to help it focus on what it was trying to say. Maybe it should've spent more time exploring Natsuko's feelings about A Tale of Perishing and how her relationship with it changes now that she's an adult with more discerning taste. Maybe it should've focused more on the relationship between art and audience, and what responsibility they have to each other when you find problems in a work you like. Hell, maybe it should have taken the corporate exploitation angle and had Natsuko been ground down through years of awful working conditions before rediscovering her passion for the art form through reconnecting with its formative past. I dunno, it feels like there's so much opportunity for Zenshu to be about more than it actually ends up being about.

But maybe that's kind of poetic in its own way. After all, this is a show about what it means to connect with a piece of art despite its flaws and love it even as you constantly wish it could've been a better, more complete version of itself. And that's pretty much where I'm at with Zenshu. I like it for what it is, even as I see all the ways it could've been so much more, and I'm probably gonna spend a lot of time wondering how I would "fix" this story if I was ever given the chance to help it realize its full potential. I doubt that was the creators' intention, but it feels like the perfect takeaway regardless. And if nothing else, I hope Mappa starts making shows like this again. Anime's lifeblood needs shows like Zenshu, even when they don't fully pan out. If it can balance its all-consuming greed with the passion for creativity that inspired it in the first place- and do so without crunching its animators into wallpaper paste- this industry will be a much better place.