ZENSHU

Do you remember your first anime? How has your discovery of that anime and the medium in general impacted your life? For some, watching anime has led them down an artistic path, whether it's just drawing pictures, drawing manga or comics, or working on new anime for others to fall in love with just as they had. Sometimes, an anime about just making animation could be the one that makes that impact on someone. Zenshuu, MAPPA's latest anime original project, is such an anime that could influence someone to go down the path of an animator. When I started watching it, I was disappointed to find out it was an isekai anime and unfairly judged it to be like all of the other generic isekai anime that have come out in the last few years (with prettier animation than normal), completely expecting myself to drop it after a couple of episodes. 12 episodes later, I've found myself to be glad I gave it a fair chance.

Zenshuu starts off with Natsuko Hirose, a young and talented animator who has already directed a successful anime series, struggling with her latest project. One day, after eating an expired clam lunch that her boss brought in and didn't throw away herself (for some reason), she collapses from food poisoning and seemingly dies. However, she wakes up and finds herself in the world of "A Tale of Perishing", her favorite anime movie and her inspiration for becoming an animator in the first place. In the world of "A Tale of Perishing", creatures called "Voids" are out to destroy the last of the "Soul Futures", crystals that keep the world alive, and a group of soldiers known as the Nine Soldiers must protect the people of the Last Town against them; however, the story is fated to come to a tragic end. In an effort to change the world and characters' fates, Natsuko fights alongside the currently surviving Nine Soldiers with the power of animation....or, to be exact, the power that she gains to summon a magical animation desk and make her drawings come to life.

As I mentioned toward the beginning of this review, I was disappointed to find that Zenshuu was an isekai anime, but over time, I came to understand that alongside other elements of this anime, it was just a part of the celebration of what makes animation special that the series displays. We don't see too much of this world outside of the Last Town, but the name of the town should make it obvious why, and even despite that, the series does do an effective job at worldbuilding. The overall story, though, does remind me a little bit of a fanfiction someone writes to "fix" the worst parts of a story, in the same vein as someone who writes a Persona 5 fanfiction that changes a certain part of its story that happens between the fourth and fifth Palaces. (If you have played Persona 5 or Persona 5 Royal, you know what I'm talking about.) I don't mind that too much, but these "fixes" make the story feel not it's not flowing as well as it could, at least in the first half. The second half of the series does improve the story's flow by a lot, though, leading to an open yet still satisfying ending.

When it comes to the characters, we first have to mention the protagonist, Natsuko Hirose. I can imagine that not a lot of fans will start off liking her, as her personality does come off as a bit selfish to start with. We can especially see this in episode 7, which is primarily a flashback episode told from the points of view of people who have interacted with Natsuko in the past; although the determination she shows in the flashback scenes to become an animator is admirable, she does also come off like she doesn't care much about other people, which can get on fans' nerves. However, she does get a good amount of character development as the series goes on, eventually getting to a point where she's able to work with other people instead of insisting on doing everything herself. It's nice to see this amount of growth from her.

That doesn't mean that the other characters are slouching in the character development department, however, even though they're not quite as interesting as Natsuko. One notable example is Memmeln, an elf girl who is one of the Nine Soldiers. She starts out possibly being the least interesting of the Nine Soldiers, but without spoiling too much, her immortality leads to her starting to go down a dark path, which led to me being more interested in her character; after she regains her will to live, she ends up being a lot more likable, even if the reason for that is kind of silly (but also serves as a nice representation of a portion of the anime community). Another character of note is Destiny, who was once the love interest of Luke, the leader of the Nine Soldiers; although her romance with Luke is no longer a thing in this version of "A Tale of Perishing" (and for good reason, too), it doesn't make her any less charming, especially with the direction her character takes in her debut episode. Speaking of Luke, he's also an interesting character with some pretty good development, and although it took me a while to really buy the direction his relationship with Natsuko was going in, it ultimately made sense. Finally, I just want to mention that Unio reminded me a bit of the mascot characters you would find in a lot of other fantasy anime, including how annoying he could be at times, which I think was the point of his character.

When talking about Zenshuu, however, there is one thing we must never forget to address, and that is its incredible presentation. Sure, the voice acting is very good, with Anna Nagase (Natsuko) and Rie Kugimiya (Unio) having especially outstanding performances. Sure, the music is also very good, both the background music and the opening and ending themes ("Zen" by BAND-MAID and "Tada, Kimi no Mama de" by Sou, respectively). However, the undoubtedly best part of Zenshuu's presentation - as well as the overall series - is its gorgeous art and animation. The backgrounds are nice to look at, the character designs are great, the more downtime-like scenes are very well-animated, and the action scenes.... My compliments to the chefs who were cooking those up! The way Natsuko's drawings brought to life are animated are pretty reminiscent of anime storyboards, too, which I feel is a nice touch. If I were in charge at MAPPA, I would be making sure the animators who worked on this were paid a lot for the amount of work they put into this, but hey, I'm sure they're getting paid fairly for this, right?

Right, MAPPA? You're paying your animators fairly for this, right? RIGHT?!?

Ahem. Anyway, Zenshuu turned out to be a pretty good anime in the end. Those who appreciate animation as an art form may get a kick out of this, even those who aren't isekai fans. Maybe it might even serve as some kind of inspiration for you, like "A Tale of Perishing" did for Natsuko!