Welcome all to our 8th season of Throwback Thursday, this time watching Twelve Kingdoms! A classic of the Isekai genre adapted in 2002 with the original Light Novel dating all the way back to 1992. It’s a 45 episode episode, so we will be doing 3 a week so we can maybe finish this by next season. Without further ado, lets dive in!
Starting off, how does this series from 2002 actually look? Well it’s a bit soon for anything definitive, but I am noticing some early inconsistencies. The first episode was a clear step up from the 2nd and 3rd, which really shouldn’t surprise anyone. The whole introductory segment at the school, the giant bird, the port, all of that looked pretty good. I particularly liked the shot of the water spirit, Jouyuu I believe it was called, processing our lead Nakajima. It was some surprisingly solid effects for 20 years ago. Sadly nothing the other two episodes had really stacked up to this. They weren’t bad, each had at least one well animated shot in them such as flying through the clouds at the start of episode 2 or some fights in 3. But they definitely had some compositing and detail issues, especially on the wide shots
Getting into the actual story, Twelve Kingdoms is an OG Isekai. I am talkin InuYasha or Magical Knight Rayearth, Isekai before Sword Art Online came in and ruined changed it. Characters from our world getting pulled into another, trapped there until they complete… something. For Twelve Kingdoms, we don’t yet know what that something is. In fact, we don’t even know if our leads can go back to our world just yet. In that way it reminds me of an old novel series called Guardians of the Flame. A Dungeons and Dragons based story about a group of kids pulled into another world, but who never actually leave. I’m very curious where Twelve Kingdoms will fall on this though. Because if it has the balls to actually have its characters stuck here for the rest of their lives like its hinting? I’ll be all in.
And I think Twelve Kingdoms might actually do that is because of not all of our characters want to leave. Of course we have our lead, Nakajima, and her best friend Asano who want to leave. Nakajima is your straight forward put-upon heroine. She doesn’t have any backbone to speak up, doesn’t speak up and just sort of does what people tell her. Even her hair, which her parents demanded she dye black, speaks to this as a clear metaphor for hiding who she truly is and feeling out of place in Japanese society. Meanwhile Asano doesn’t have much in the way of personality beyond that morally upright childhood friend. Maybe he will grow in as the future goes on and he is forced to separate from the rest of our party, but he hasn’t done much so far. However the most interesting of the group by far is Sugimoto.
Because Sugimoto, as I alluded to earlier, is actually all in on this adventure. She is your chuuni, your character who always wanted to go to a fantasy realm and hates reality. It’s a pretty clear analogy for those who ignore reality in our world. Who think all their problems are because of everyone else, rather than their own shortcomings. As we see throughout these three episodes how deluded Sugimoto is, demanding that she be the chosen one instead of Nakajima. That she is the one Keiki bring to the other world and be given the sword to. She believes in this world she can be the hero, and I can’t wait for her to become the villain. Because I am fully expecting some Judas sort of betrayal from her before the series is over. All so she can live in this world, rather than return to our own.
As for the world, this is the weakest part of Twelve Kingdoms so far. Just the name of the anime, Twelve Kingdoms, gives away the issue. There is just to much stuff going on and not enough time for us to know anything about it. What are the Kingdoms? What are these Youma? Does every Kingdom have a King/Queen, are there wars, etc etc the list goes on. Of course we do get some answers, we learn about the Kingdom of Kei and its Queen for example. The war raging, the refugee’s, the play etc. Credit where its due, these were all done well. And in a way it makes us feel just like our protagonists, lost in a foreign world with no idea what is happening. So long as Twelve Kingdoms can keep that feed of information coming without drowning us in exposition, it should be fine.
That isn’t to say it did everything wrong though setting wise. Beyond the politics, Twelve Kingdoms did a fine enough job implying things about our protagonists as well. For instance we learn that people from Japan are common enough to have a specific word, Kaikyaku, and laws just for them. People here know about China, even if its just a mythical place, etc. Our leads are not the first people here, in fact it seems like a regular occurrence. So the question then becomes: Where are they? What happened to them? Were they all executed, and if so what what lies in wait for our leads? Between this and the actual physics of the world, such as the King laughing at how babies come from women in our world, Twelve Kingdoms makes it very clear that we aren’t in Kansas anymore.
Finally, after all the setup and all that yadda yadda, we can get to the actual episodes. Whew. I’ve already largely covered everything so this will go quickly. Episode 1, “Shadow of the Moon, the Sea of Shadow – The First Chapter” implies a lot of things. Just off the title it feels like an Avatar: The Last Airbender setup, with a number of books, each book being a set episode length with its own major thread. In a way its like Twelve Kingdoms is setting itself up to be viewed as 4 seasons, rather than 1 long show. As far as the episode itself goes, I thought it was a pretty strong introduction. Things happened, they happened quickly and we were thrown right into the action. I said above the production was strongest in this episode, so Twelve Kingdoms really kicked things off with a bang.
Sadly episode 2, “Shadow of the Moon, the Sea of Shadow – The Second Chapter” wasn’t as strong. We got a lot of introductions into this work, such as the Kaikyaku, but few of them actually worked. Information was gotten across but it felt very clearly like exposition. Meanwhile the actual visuals weren’t as impressive as the first episode, narratively or visually. For instance, I hadn’t even noticed Nakajima had changed in appearance until it was pointed out. In fact I’m still not sure she actually has. Part of this has to do with only knowing her for a single episode, but its also how similar the designs seem to be. Ill have to double check this, but it was really weird. It nailed things like only Nakajima being able to speak their language, etc. But overall the episode wasn’t able to live up to the first.
Finally episode 3, whose title you can guess. I actually liked this episode, I think it ramped up again after episode 2 stumbled a bit. The introduction of Takki, a non-violent resident of this world, is a great addition. She provides a new point of view and a way for our leads to get established in this world. It takes us away from an eternal hunt through an unknown land and turns it into a hiking trip, if only temporarily. We now have a clear goal, meeting Takki’s sister. And on top of that, we also got my favorite sequence in the show yet with the masked man. Twelve Kingdoms did a fantastic job with Nakajima’s insecurities, of playing up her parents presence in her head and their effects on her. The mask sequence as a whole was just… great. Visually, narratively, in every way I loved it.
So all in all, how were the first 3 episodes of Twelve Kingdoms? I would have to say that, as far as introductions go… it worked. I’m interested, I want to see where this series goes. I want to see Sugimoto’s inevitable betrayal, Nakajima grow into a Chosen One-esque character, Asano to become… something. No idea what yet, but he will become something. The production doesn’t bother me to much. I love well animated action, but if the story is engaging enough I can get over a less than stellar production. So the question now is: Can Twelve Kingdoms keep this up for the next 42 episodes? I guess we will just have to watch and see. I hope you readers come along on the ride with me. See ya next week.
Of note, this is by Shiki and ghost hunt’s author . I don’t think the 12 kingdoms is complete though, at least this anime adaptation isn’t.
I saw up to the last arc.
I do recall heavy heavy dialogue.
I also remember the female leads dad being a conservative prick.
Hot damn, those are some striking images in the grid at the beginning of the post. Top right in particular made me think, “Twelve Kingdoms looked like THAT?”
Trust me, I was surprised to.
Twelve Kingdoms is IMO, overall one of the best isekai anime of the 2000s. However, it has highs and lows in pacing, and I would regard its first arc the weakest, due mainly to the unsympathetic portrayal of the main characters in the beginning.
But the characters grow, given this spacious ceiling, and the writers make full use of it; give it time.
While there is exposition, the world-building is not explained in that exposition, as the way the world WORKS is revealed by the plot progression. And this progression displays the development of the characters themselves, who influence the world and are changed dramatically as the story progresses and pays off. Listen not to the words, but to when and how the words are delivered in their context, where the exposition is less “lecture”, but actually either an act of deception and malice, or an act of kindness and empathy.
Twelve Kingdoms’ ultimate weakness, really, is the “ending” – in that the anime does not complete the story.
Nevertheless, this is a well told story. It has excellent production values for its time, good voice acting (never heard the english version, if there is one), and even its main demerit (lack of an ending) will have you wishing they will revisit Twelve Kingdoms for its conclusion.
Ill keep an ear out! Twelve Kingdoms did good on this introduction, so I aint to worried. I have heard of the ending woes as well, so hopefully the journey is enough to offset it being an incomplete story.
Twelve Kingdoms is IMO, overall one of the best isekai anime, period. It has one of the best examples of character development I’ve ever seen in aminme.