Concrete Revolutio

Episode 21

Concrete Revolutio is moving closer to its grand finale, giving us more and more clues about its world, its characters, and the message it intends to ultimately send. In doing so, it's also tying together its various loose ends. Much of Concrete Revolutio's first cour was seemingly unconnected episodic adventures, as the Superhuman Bureau tackled the "rogue superhuman of the week." Increasingly, we're seeing what parts these characters play in the larger story, as Concrete Revolutio brings them back or otherwise reminds us of past episodes.

Previous episodes have done an excellent job of this, focusing on one or two memorable characters or concepts, like Earth-chan or the Bugmen. This not only preserves continuity and worldbuilding, but often makes thematic connections between the different episodes. For example, both of the Bugmen's appearances dealt with human development's unintentional effects on the environment. Aki's reappearance as a character in her own right, and not just part of a girl group, helped to humanize a past villain—and show how they were all victims of the same corrupt system. Unfortunately, this episode doesn't retain that focus. It's moving its pieces into place too fast, without reminding us who all of them are. It's much less striking when a major player (like Claude) gets a mention if he's just one name in a deluge of references we need to make sense of again. If there was ever an anime that could benefit from the kind of "previously on" segments we get in American TV shows, Concrete Revolutio is it.

It doesn't help that even the "present-day" plot is getting increasingly complicated. As characters keep switching sides and evolving in their motivations, it's harder and harder to keep track of exactly what is going on. All the old characters returning just made this worse, since we now have to keep track of where they are in this new order. Concrete Revolutio has just spread its character-writing too thin, giving all of it to a few main characters like Jiro, while the rest of the cast remain archetypal and simple. If they don't show up enough to remind us what ideas they represent, they can blend into the background completely. "Casts of thousands" can work for a thematically-driven story like this, but you need to use all those pieces well. I know Shō Aikawa pulled off this balance in Fullmetal Alchemist, but it seems like he's so focused on the big picture that he forgot to make the smaller details compelling.

Luckily, the broad strokes of "Steel Ogre" are still very strong. The episode jumps forward to the summer of 1974, where superhumans are increasingly shunned by society, and the Prime Minister's reveal of being one is a scandal he must address. He does it by creating a new security force to deal with "superhuman crimes," called NUTS, to show the public that he obviously cares about their fear of superhumans. NUTS are mechas that appear to be piloted by superhumans, but are actually driven by ordinary humans. They're another product of the group that used to be Imperial Ads, which now seems to be on surprisingly good terms with the Superhuman Bureau, even if they don't quite understand them. Emi and Kikko school them on how their rigid idea of "superhuman" excludes yokai, which are now responsible for the 1973 Middle-Eastern oil crisis.

During this scene, I was struck by one of the biggest differences between Concrete Revolutio and one of its major stated influences, Watchmen. The former takes the same basic set of real world historical events and just shows how they might be different if superhumans were involved. It often feels like we're going through a checklist, from The Beatles at the Budokan, to the Shinjuku riots, to the Sapporo Olympics, and now the 1973 oil crisis. Watchmen, on the other hand, looked at how the presence of superheroes in its world might alter the course of history. For example, using them as human WMDs allows the United States to win the Vietnam War. Clearly, Concrete Revolutio has something to say about these specific historical moments, but it feels like a missed opportunity not to explore this avenue. Luckily, this episode finally changes history in its conclusion.

Before that, Michiko Touzaki, the woman who heads Imperial Ads (or did earlier in the timeline—it's hard to know what the agency is now), gets a chance to pilot the NUTS against Aki, as she's trying to escape from them. It's an interesting reunion, given that Aki used to be managed by Imperial Ads as a part of the Angel Stars, and Michiko clearly recognizes her. This does not go well for the NUTS, and after this climactic battle, they're retired as a failure. Luckily for them, they still managed to advance the group's larger goals, which is to discredit the public's views on superhumans so that they can eliminate them. They discuss an upcoming film with a script that's extremely negative about superhumans.

It's interesting to watch the evolution of Michiko's attitude throughout this episode. All throughout the series, she's been framed as an antagonist, willing to take whatever position allows her group to get ahead. She seemed perfectly fine with this plan earlier. After she gets a taste of what it's like to be a superhuman, though—in her NUTS costume—it's clear her feelings have shifted somewhat. She keeps looking at the helmet longingly, like she wishes she could use it again. This may be why she agrees to meet up with Jiro, who wants to understand why the helmet spoke in the voice of Claude. Jin needed to hide his real identity, but there's no reason for Michiko to do that. She doesn't have an answer, but Jiro's determined to get to the bottom of it, so he puts the helmet on.

He's met with flashbacks to his childhood, as well as outright time travel (to a conversation he couldn't have witnessed as an infant). We've seen a lot of this already throughout the show, but it takes on new meaning thanks to what we've learned about Jiro since then. When Jiro spilling blood seems to traumatize Aki, sending her on a rampage and even leaving strange skin markings behind, others wonder if there's something "monstrous" in his blood. It's had similar effects on animals when he's bled on them too. Jiro mentions the kaiju inside him, but he doesn't know anything more. In the flashback though, we see an example of his blood abilities going wrong and finally learn the possible reasons behind them.

So yeah, it turns out the key to Concrete Revolutio is indeed the atomic bomb. I had wondered when the nuclear arms race was going to show up in this series or what the metaphor/replacement for it would be. Then, Concrete Revolutio hits us with something that is both shocking and extremely obvious: the bomb didn't hit Hiroshima at all, but Jiro absorbed it. It's obvious because we knew baby Jiro was found in that place and time, but shocking in its specifics and the enormous implications it has for both Jiro as a character and the series' larger themes. It's also one case where the series bringing back earlier episode details we barely remember works to its advantage. The reveal would not have been as shocking if we could remember that information from an episode ago, instead of being suddenly reminded of that striking visual right before explaining its importance.

That twist comes in the best sequence of the episode, as a flame-bodied Jiro travels through his personal history. It's a rare moment of tranquility in an episode packed as tight as sardines in a can. That sequence alone makes the episode as a whole so much stronger, but it's frustrating to see Concrete Revolutio falling back into some old bad habits. Hopefully the team can learn to juggle its unwieldy cast, so the important points don't get lost beneath them. Thankfully, this week's themes were strong enough to survive.

Rating: B

Concrete Revolutio is currently streaming on Funimation.

Rose is a music Ph.D. student who loves overanalyzing anime soundtracks. Follow her on her media blog Rose's Turn, and on Twitter.