Deca-Dence – 09 [Turbo Charger]

Look, I’ll be honest here. I am biased towards Deca-Dence.

I tend to overlook its flaws and shower praise on the many many things it does right. I do it because there simply hasn’t been another anime so unabashedly rife with real world commentary and socio-political allegory… ever? Well, certainly not one in recent memory.

And even though it has had absolute belters for episodes (especially at the start), episodes which have been an absolute delight to write about, I’ll admit that I don’t even know where to begin with this one.

But yes, I can’t not start off by praising the writers for the show.  While it’s clear that the strengths of the writing team is in the world-building (it is the main draw for the viewers, after all), the fact that the writers were able to subtly put in so many red herrings in the narrative along the course of the previous 8 episodes only to have them all converge in spectacular fashion here is frankly a feat to just marvel at.

Be it Natsume losing her right arm with her chip in it and being recognized as a bug by the system or the fact that Gadolls have a defense mechanism of creating an anti-gravity force field around them or the fact that Kaburagi has a Gadoll for a pet… everything just fits so perfectly that it’s a minor miracle.

Secondly, let’s talk about the unsung heroes: the production team. In a medium where so many production committees green-lit shows for the sole purpose of making a quick buck no matter what kind of crap they put out for a blindsided fan-base to consume (capitalism really is everywhere, you guys!) it’s such a refreshing sight to see Studio Nut allowing the kind of creative freedom Yuzuru Tachikawa and his team have gotten on this project. To give auteurs the license to do whatever they want with a show without worrying about the commercial value of the art they create is something thoroughly commendable and the lovely people at Studio Nut deserve a pat on the back for their work.

As for the episode itself, it was absolutely glorious. Not in the show-stopping ‘one action set-piece upon another’ way of Episode 5 but more on a thematic and emotional level. There were poignant character moments and earned narrative payoffs. There was a brilliantly choreographed boss fight between two bosses – either of them willingly and unwillingly part of a parasitic capitalist establishment. There was a beaten-down war soldier realizing the cruel nature of the ‘game’ this entire world is and deciding to just have fun playing it. There were celebratory moments of triumph. There was the burden of victory. And of course, there was the sledgehammer of reality cutting through the façade of a life.

Like I said, it was glorious.

But of course, no discussion of glory would ever be complete without talking about Sarkozy. Like a lot of people who spend their lives scraping the bottom of the barrel, Sark just wants to be seen. To be championed, to be praised; to just be told that he matters. He knows he is a simpleton, gullible, un-special. But for once in his life, he just wants to be a hero. He goes along with Turkey’s plan, realizing that he is being manipulated all for the reason that someone will tell him that he did a good job. But he is not a hero. At his very core, he can never be. Resting against a wall, bruised, battered and about to run out of battery. Sitting there after realizing how he is responsible for the suffering and deaths of the very people he wanted to be loved by, he sees Turkey and even in that moment, he doesn’t put up a fight against him. Even in that moment, he asks for him to take him along and run away. Because he never was brave enough to put up a fight. But there was one thing he could do which no one else can. He could make one hell of a drink. And here’s the thing about alcohol. It burns. He takes the literal crap up his ass one final time and burns everything to the ground, including himself.

A hero’s death for a coward.

And yes, finally, that brings us to the harrowing final moments of the episode. And I honestly don’t want to dissect those because they speak for themselves in the weight that they carry. Even though it was always going to happen, the manner in which it is revealed with Natsume asking, hoping, begging for another explanation from Kaburagi for everything she has seen is just a heartbreaking sight.

Fittingly, as expected off a mission with the objective to commit mass genocide, this one too doesn’t end with a triumph but does so with a whimper.