The Fall 2016 Anime Preview Guide

Occultic;Nine

Nine individuals are on different but gradually converging paths concerning occult matters. Yuta Gamon is an enterprising NEET ambitious to make money through his affiliate blog Kiri Kiri Basara, which focuses on occult matters, with his busty long-time friend as a subordinate. That results in him connecting with a teen fortune-teller he idolizes, but it also leads to him finding a nasty surprise when he goes to interview a leading Japanese Paranormal researcher. Meanwhile, the son of that researcher is warned both by the fortune-teller and by a mysterious woman to check on his father, while a mysterious young man makes cryptic suggestions about the researcher coming to an ill end. The owner of a shop dedicated to curses and the ghostly “devil” who accompanies her get their own nasty surprise in her mailbox, and the editor of the researcher checks out his newest work. Occultic;Nine is based on a series of light novels and can be found streaming on Crunchyroll, Saturdays at 12:30 PM EST.

Rebecca Silverman

Rating:

I am fairly certain that Occultic;Nine is going to be a supernatural murder mystery. I can't be 100% positive, however, because so little of this introductory episode doesn't make sense, including the semi-colon in the title or the fact that “occultic” isn't a word. If I had to guess, I would say that self-professed NEET Yuta's discovery of Professor Hashigami's scalped corpse at the end of the episode is going to tie in with the supposed resurrection of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), and that the creepy curse girl who was snuggling up to the professor's scalp (which was dropped in her mailbox) will not turn out to be the instigator of the curse, but involved nonetheless. If that's the case, this might turn out to be an interesting series.

It will have to overcome some of the hurdles it sets up for itself in this first episode, however. Chief among those is the near-constant introduction of characters, which for someone like me who isn't great at remembering names is a major problem. In a typical shounen show, the chief offenders in the “too many named characters” category, you can at least usually tell who is worth remembering based on the story arc, but in a deliberately confusing case like this, it can be almost anxiety-inducing to figure out who you need to keep track of. That all of the characters are deliberately quirky only adds to the confusion.

Speaking of “quirky,” isn't it about time the stereotype of the heavily-made up and feminized middle-aged man was retired? This episode is full of trope characters, with Izumin the bartender being the most overtly offensive; it also includes perky-yet-dim Ryoka, school (and pop) idol Miyuu, a hard-nosed reporter, a creepy psychic girl in a Goth Loli gown, and a mysterious woman in the rain. The fact that Yuto calls himself a NEET when he's actively going to school (doesn't NEET stand for “not employed, in education, or training?”) may suggest that there's a statement about stereotyped characters, and if that's the case, there is the potential for a lot of commentary. I'm hoping that holds true for the absolutely ludicrous size of Ryoka's breasts as well – they almost look grotesque on her frame. It does feel very possible that such a commentary is intended, given Yuta's very self-aware language, and a mystery aware that it is a mystery being solved is an interesting concept.

The execution of this episode as a whole, however, feels like reading paragraphs out of five different books simultaneously. It's confusing and makes so much noise that it's difficult to tell what we're supposed to pay attention to. The abrupt switches in color schemes, which did work in Flip Flappers, just adds to the jumble here, making this something of a headache to watch. Occultic;Nine has potential buried under its self-aware madness. Now it needs to calm itself down, take a deep breath, and build on it.

Theron Martin

Rating:

As can probably be told from the style of the series' title, this adaptation is based on work by the author of Steins;Gate. However its delivery style and spirit, as well as the way it bounces around its rather large core cast, more resembles a Durarara or possibly even K. Whatever the series most reminds you of, though, one thing's for sure: this is a very, very busy first episode.

My guess is that the intent here is to introduce all of the characters who will be the major players up front and then explore each of them more as that person's aspect of the story comes up. The fun will, of course, then be in seeing how all of their stories gradually come together in what I'm presuming will be one main story, perhaps one having something to do with the bodies floating in the water in the episode's opening scenes. Already we have some indications of how this might happen, as paths have already started to intersect; the fortune-teller has apparently seen something which indicates that it's in her best interest to work with the blogger, for instance. Everything seems to center around Dr. Himegami, whose body that appears to be in the very brief final shot. That body looks like it's been scalped, which means that the bloody scalp which appeared in curse girl's mailbox earlier in the episode is probably his. So does that make the woman who showed up at curse girl's place seeking the death curse his mistreated wife? And why did he seem to be spelling out “code” in blood as he died?

The nature of the beast is mysteries like that, and any number of them already abound here. In fact, there's so much going on, and so many character introductions which fly by so fast, that the episode might even be too busy (or at least spreading itself too thinly) for its own good. While the content is quite graphic, the camera doesn't dwell on such scenes, instead favoring brief flashes for shock value. It also has a weird sensibility about fan service. Nothing too intense there, except that the blogger's girl has a rack that would make any other female character these season seem paltry by comparison, and at least one other female character looks to be very well-endowed, too. Naturally she's a ditz. (And what's up with ray gun? Is that something real or a just a running joke between the two?)

In all, the series may end up being good, but I'd want to see how it manages its plotlines before making any such judgment call.

Paul Jensen

Rating:

You could give me all the caffeine in the world and I still wouldn't be able to jump around as much or as quickly as the first episode of Occultic;Nine. With a large ensemble cast and a story about strange and sinister things going on in a busy city, it's operating in the same space as shows like Durarara. This episode tries its best to present the kind of deliberately convoluted beginning that similar titles have used in the past, but it's just not working for me. Instead of coming across as complex and intriguing, it feels messy and disjointed.

Some of my problems with the show stem from protagonist and self-declared NEET Yuta. The guy talks a mile a minute regardless of whether he's narrating or having a conversation with another character, and good grief it's annoying. Even if you were to slow him down a little, he still wouldn't be all that likable. The “I'm lazy, awkward, and kind of a jerk! Isn't that funny?” routine has been used by enough shows at this point that it's lost most of its novelty, and Yuta has yet to display any of the redeeming qualities that often make similar characters tolerable.

Much like Yuta, this episode as a whole seems like it's trying to hide a lack of appealing features behind its frantic pace and constant promises of compelling storylines. It hops from scene to scene, flashing character names on all-too- brief title cards and rarely staying in one place long enough for the audience to get more than a basic idea of what's going on. I'm all for using unconventional storytelling techniques, but a series still needs to convince the viewer that the payoff will be worth the effort. This doesn't mean that Occultic;Nine will necessarily be a bad show, but the impression it gives in this episode is one of a series with more style than substance.

For better or for worse, there aren't many definitive conclusions that can be made about this show from its first episode. It's telling the kind of story that has been very entertaining in other titles, and the cast is large enough that someone is bound to make up for Yuta's obnoxiousness eventually. If you can keep up with its frantic pacing, it might be worth sticking around to see what comes of all these plots and character arcs. Otherwise, you might be better off waiting for a few weeks until the internet hive mind has had time to make sense of it all.

Nick Creamer

Rating:

Occultic;Nine leaves me utterly baffled. It seems like there could easily be an interesting story here, once you get past all the rambling self-awareness and disjointed storytelling. And there's certainly plenty of artistic talent here - the show's art design is great, animation flat-out unbelievable for a TV production, and direction active and often inspired. And yet every element of the show essentially dares you to keep watching.

The show's cold open is a good example of its contradictions. The initial hook is the image of a scattering of bodies face-down in a pool - but we're not introduced to those bodies in a way that conveys threat or horror or anything that might tonally apply to their existence. Instead, the show flashes through a bunch of Guy Ritchie-style quick cuts, undercutting any possible emotional response to the narrative content with self-indulgently “cool” directorial tricks. The show has stuff to tell us, but it's not going to let the material do the work.

The direction starts to better match the material after that, but the next problem here is that everything happens at 2.5x speed. I initially thought the high-speed dialogue was just a quirk of the aggressively annoying protagonist Yuta, but basically every scene and character moves in fast-forward, again removing any possible emotional resonance from the material. Occultic;Nine feels like the summary of an outline of itself - though there are plenty of scenes here that are supposed to convey horror or unease or comedy, everything happens at such a hyperactive pace that the ultimate result is emotionally blank.

Finally, there's the fact that so much of the content here is just fundamentally bad. Yuta is a self-assigned NEET with an occult affiliate blog who just will not shut up, basically the least likable template for a protagonist. His friend Ryoka has impossibly huge breasts, and the show undercuts any attempt to take her seriously by both constantly centering the camera on them and giving her the personality of a five-year- old. The owner of the bar where they hang out is an effeminate gay stereotype. These are ostensibly the characters we're supposed to care the most about.

There are plenty of other issues here too, many of which simply come down to the show's bizarre assumption that an audience will care about events happening simply because they're happening at all. We're introduced to too many characters and given basically nothing to invest us in any of them, all while a fundamentally simple murder mystery plays out in the background. Every character speaks in grim portents, but nobody has an opportunity to do anything but react to the one or two minor events they're pushed through. Occultic;Nine's premiere is a mashed pile of sped-up Stuff Happening.

And yet, all of this nonsense is gifted with great art design (outside of Ryoka), strong direction (if we forgive both Ryoka and the tension-demolishing pacing), and consistently movie-tier character animation. Occultic;Nine is an unwatchable mess of astonishing talent. What a frustrating waste.