DISCLAIMER: this is an original review of an original show from one of our own reviewers. His ignorance of future characters and plot points may limit his perspective on the series as it unfolds. Proceed with caution!
At there episodes mark, Kemurikusa’s strengths weaknesses are more in clear view now. In a positive side, the world building proves to be ambiguous and compelling. I’m always a fan of a near apocalyptic world where human race has regressed and declined and somehow lose many historical and technological context from its ancestors (many of my favorite anime has this settings: Humanity Has Declined, Sora no Woto, Girls’ Last Tour). This week, we have a glimpse of the next island and it appears to be ruins from our very society. There’s a amusement park, there’s many abandoned buildings that could be the what left of a catastrophe we haven’t yet learnt about. One interesting fact is that the girls regard themselves as human, even though they have their own kemurikusa leaf inside their body and just drinks water to survive. It’s fascinating because with that one remark we get a good idea that these girls have never encountered any real human being before, not up to this point anyway.
The ED that appears this week, along with some passing comments from the girls, do an amazing job of fleshing out these kemurikusa girls’ backstory. We soon learn that there were more team members and many already died before the start of this event. If this ED is any indication we also know about the order of their disease as well. There was a girl called Ryouko whom Rin and Ritsu are quite fond of. She was seen as the one who teaches these girls all the basic survival stuffs. Then there were Ryou and Riku, and two of the six-pack who bite the dust (one of the Rinas died in the first episode). Based on what I heard the OVA and shorts did include them, and I don’t know about these kemurikusa girls enough to know if they can be revived in any way. So far though, I feel a clear sense that the body count will likely to increase as the girls moving to several islands now. The box of grey urns have the same number of the girls who passed away, so it makes sense for me why Rin treasures them so much.
We also learn about “The First Person”, the one that gives birth to all the girls. For now, my theory is that this person learns about the human destruction so they creates this new humankind to survive. While nothing is concrete yet I have a sense that this world is a result of advanced technology went berserk that destroys all the lives on earth. It comes for a reason that these girls function like a plant, one of the most natural resource of them all. Like I said, this world is so layered and intriguing that so much has been discussed, yet there’s still more mysteries around the corner.
In a negative side though, Wakata is still the weakest link but he isn’t the dealbreaker for me. The dialogues aren’t that good to be honest, and it feels rather clumsy the way Rin already develops some physical feeling to Wakata. Many has argued that if Wakata were a girl, we wouldn’t consider him as annoying in which I say, NO. The truth of the matter is that he doesn’t feel like he belong to this world, and while part of the narrative is designed that way, I can’t help but feel Kemurikusa deserves a much more tolerable male protagonist.
