Another week, another episode of Dororo. This time we learn the mystery of Dororo’s back, meet a new demon and get a lot of parallels to their current overall situation. Lets jump in!
Starting off, Dororo once again is a bit disappointing on the production front. There were a number of dull or sliding stills, such as the large baby ghost… thing. Where it basically slid across the screen most of the time it was on. That isn’t to say there weren’t some nice shots. Opening on the monochrome flashback with the red fire was nice. As was the short fight near the end and the transformation sequence. But all in all, Dororo hasn’t wowed me since coming back for the 2nd season. Considering how this first cour started and ended, this is more than a little disappointing. Even when it wasn’t particularly active on screen, it was at least visually interesting. However this is neither most of the time. At least the story itself remains interesting though.
For the story, this was much better. I am still not sure we need the mystery of Dororo’s back and the fortune, but I like the options it gives. While there is plenty of plot without it, what it does is force our characters to ask “what about after?”. Or even before maybe. It gives them a possible out, an alternative to this war and death and suffering. Now they can choose. Kill the demons and destroy the land? Let the demons live, get the money and leave? Or some kind of variation there of. I suspect what will happen is they will kill the demons, then use the money to help the land survive the following famine. Afterall, the demons are keeping the land strong. It may even help Hyakki to take over as lord. But this feels to happy to me, so no doubt Dororo has more planned.
With the rest of the episode, Dororo is doing something interesting here. It’s turned this arc into a microcosm of the story as a whole. With the local lord making a deal with a demon, killing travelers for the prosperity of his land. Will what they do here reflect what they will do with Daigo? The land as a whole? If nothing else, if done right, it should force them to confront these questions and address some of Hyakki’s building rage. Meanwhile it’s also a retread of, episode 2 I think, where there was another demon taking care of a village the same way. However now our leads have grown, have new problems, and new considerations. Will this just mimic that same story? Regardless, Dororo should be able to force a lot of interesting dilemma’s on our characters here if done well.
Normally, I would give Dororo some flack for retreading an episode like I said it’s doing. I did it for Mob Psycho afterall. And on some level, it does annoy me abit. Why tell the same story twice? But here at least Dororo is introducing a new layer to the whole thing, with the mystery. It has established the temple, what happened to it, we have characters who have lied about it and apparently its some kind of village secret. There is plenty to unpack here, and if Dororo starts going for some longer form arcs, I definitely wouldn’t mind. It would be a nice change of pace that would fit more easily into Dororo’s developing family drama. Something to slow it down until the climactic finale.
Speaking of that finale, and all the demons that will be involved (terrible seque just roll with it), let’s talk moth lady. Apparently she is very aware of who Hyakki is and what he does. The Amazon subs, terrible as they are, make it a bit ambiguous just where she lands though. I couldn’t tell if she was one of the twelve he was sacrificed to, or if she as a demon is just aware of the deal. I find the latter much more interesting personally, as it means Hyakki is a known quantity among demons and spirits. Which could lead to some interesting interactions in the future with other sentient talking demons. We already have one who has escaped them/was let loose in the first cour. This could be a good way to bring them back in to the story as well.
With the first option however, one has to wonder, what will Hyakki get back from here? It’s been awhile since Hyakki has gotten any body part back. And considering how many he needs, that is more than surprising. So where he to get something back, what would it be? My suspicion? The eyes. There has been a lot of focus on eyes in this episode. From the creepy Lord Sabame, to the ghost baby itself, eyes were large parts of both of the designs. Also, it would allow Hyakki to actually be able to read Dororo’s back tattoo. By the way, real quick, I thought the mother’s line about “Someone you could truly trust” to be quite interesting. After all, it requires Dororo to show her bare back to someone in essentially a bath. Perhaps this points towards a possible romance, but I hope it stays familial in nature.
So all in all, how was Dororo? Good enough. The production side was rather weak, but the story itself was much better than last weeks. Even if it doesn’t affect the overall story, Sabame’s arc does present moral dilemmas that will be relevant for the series as a whole. Meanwhile Dororo’s back gives our characters more options. I wish the old man wasn’t as ham-fisted with it, leaving the audience and our leads to puzzle it out on their own. However Dororo has to finish up in this cour, so I can understand why they did this. I would rather Dororo have to ham-fist some of its plot points and end, than take it to slow and us have to wait for a 2nd season that will never come. So, largely, I am satisfied with this episode and hope Dororo can use this as a springboard after last week.
