Spoilers might need you to pay for their meal.
Okey, it’s time to change things up… Or not. I feel like I’ve been hooked into mostly isekai lately (genre or no genre, it’s a thing), so I decided to try a reverse isekai. This is not about a japanese kid getting pulled into a fantasy world. This is about characters from fantasy worlds showing up in Japan. To push the creativity forward, these are all made up IPs that are supposed to be popular but are newly created for this show. The amazing thing is that they all feel like premises to “real” anime shows I’d like to watch.
The anime Re: Creators was directed by Ei Aoki and written by Rei Hiroe and Ei Aoki for the Troyca studio. It streams exclusively on Amazon Video. A young japanese student named Mizushino Sōta is watching Elemental Symphony of Vogelchevalier when a weird glitch causes him to witness the battle between Selesia Upitiria and an unknown enemy. After another glitch brings him back to his room, he finds Selesia has been transported with him to the real world. Soon he will find more characters from other IPs will appear as well.
The characters that appear have things in common. They’re not always the main characters of their universe, they all want to find who created them and they’ve got plenty of flaws or are dealing with tragedies that they want their creators to resolve. The creators then become part of the story as they had diverse levels of commitment depending on the personality they were trying to write. Although you’ve never seen these characters, it’s really hard to believe they’re not part of a running show because they feel so familiar.
As more characters appear, we meet Meteora Österreich, who is a NPC from an RPG. Yūya Mirokuji who is the antagonist from an action anime. They all have something in common, they’ve all seen the Military Uniform Princess who we later learn is called Altair. I will leave it to you to find out what she represents and where she came from. Suffice to say, she plays the villain in the real world but her origin is unknown. I felt that revelation, when it finally comes, to be really anti-climatic. Yes, she has a back story, but you’re never given the clues to figure it out. It’s not a detective story.
Eventually the Japanese government takes interest in what’s going on and recruits both characters and creators to take on Altair and her group. This is where things take a turn as Meteora discovers Altair is trying to bring about the end of the world. Yes, it’s a bit of a stretch but as her origin is discovered we see her true motivations. It all comes down to a full on confrontation, as creators prepare scripts and spin offs to empower their creations. Anything less would’ve been disappointing.
Highly recommended to anime fans, specially those that have ever had a favourite character they thought never receive the proper justice. It does help if you have even a passing interests in how characters are written and/or anime and manga are made, although it does become a bit of a love letter to anime characters at some point. The characters are well made and charismatic. Tropes are not ignored, but they’re reasoned out. It might be more enjoyable for those hardcore fans than the casual anime viewer.
That will do for now.
Never Think Impossible 