#garokawa -restore the world-

[yurisorcerer]

Watched this with the oomf @joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, basically on a whim from the both of us. It's an hourish long movie and we weren't really expecting much especially given that it has a fairly low score on most anime ranking websites. Surprisingly though, it's actually really fucking good? I'd describe this as sort of a loose, less polished cousin of Flip Flappers, if anything. Several editing decisions give away that this is probably the remains of what was originally a slightly longer project, but even that in mind, what's here is amazingly coherent and just very strong overall.

Our basic conceit involves magical girls who live inside a computer (already a very good starting point), and early parts of the film feel decidedly Madoka-inspired (not a term I use lightly), but it quickly goes off in its own direction and starts dealing with these very big themes of self-determination and humanity. It's also a surprisingly spiritual film in a way that I find difficult to precisely pin down; something about the promise of humanity living on through the things we create feels that way to me.

Visually, lots of interesting use of space and color; a non-zero amount of the film takes place in a blue void filled with CGI spirals that characters nonetheless stand on like it's nothing, there's also some great use of monochrome and near-monochrome and a lot of absolutely picturesque landscape shots. I could make a few minor complaints---namely the editing, and I think a certain kind of person will be bothered by the presence of some fanservice especially in the later parts of the movie---but overall I really liked this and highly recommend it if anything I just said sounds interesting to you.

[abster07]

Just finished watching the film Garokawa - Restore the World-. Didn't expect this to be a feels anime! Not too strong, but the feels were there. Great anime film!