Dusk Beyond the End of the World

Episode 10

Nine episodes. Ten, actually, if you count episode zero. This anime has been building up this flashback that entire time. And yet still, the result is messier than I ever could've catastrophized. I'm almost in awe.

Let's start with the most obvious thing: If this anime had come out before 2020, I might have been willing to believe that more or less the entire population of the world uncritically accepted nanomachines into their body because it sounded like an objectively good idea. I'm sure I don't need to go into detail when I say that in a post-2020 world, I just don't have it in me to be able to suspend my disbelief to the extent that I'd buy that the overwhelming majority of the global population over a very short period of time uncritically accepted nanomachines into their body—to say nothing of the fact that hackable nanomachines were somehow made commercially available (and at a price point people were willing and able to afford, no less) so soon. You're telling me that there were few or no time-consuming hurdles—extensive testing and so on—that these had to overcome before hitting the public? That there was no significant backlash? We soon see that they're hack-able and that just seems, I don't know, like the kind of thing that would've been rigorously tested at some point before it became widely available.

This is all to say nothing of the elephant in the room: In the universe of the anime, we know that Towasa's research is super controversial. Lest we forget, the first major event of the series is an attempt on her life. So that she's such a controversial figure only makes it feel even more wildly unlikely that so many people would just willingly accept her nanotechnology so quickly. Not only are we given no reason to believe the femtoblood was met with any significant amount of pushback or criticism, but the anime paints it as so popular that practically the entire globe got it more or less overnight, at a truly breakneck speed that outpaces anything I can think of by a huge margin.

To put things into perspective, according to the GSMA (global system for mobile communications association), in 2023, global smartphone ownership had just reached 54%. And I know there's a bunch of asterisks and qualifiers that can come with trying to define the specific traits that make a smartphone, but the first iPhone was released in 2007. Meanwhile, in Dusk, the femtoblood was perfected in 2045, and it seems to be by or in 2047 that over 90% of the global population had it.

Maybe this is a bit more nitpicky, but I also have a hard time believing that there wasn't an intense learning curve with having nanomachines in your body, and essentially having a computer UI within your vision whenever you wanted to. I can't help but feel reminded of how much better Ciconia: When They Cry tackled this idea, but I digress.

In any case, “people might hack the nanomachines” sounds like exactly the kind of fear that people would have about nanomachines in their body if those were to become commercially available. And, as I mentioned earlier, it seems like exactly the kind of thing that would've been tested for before they hit the public. A level of believability isn't always necessary in anime, and I'm sure some of you won't find it as important as I am right now. But in an anime trying to play itself as earnestly as this one has been, there's a certain, minimum baseline I expect it to hit. And, as you've probably noticed, it's missed that mark completely, and to a wild extent.

And I haven't even gotten to the actual AI war itself. I'm skeptical that Towasa wouldn't have had some manner of safety protocols in the AI of hers that eventually went on to functionally cause the AI war. That's to say nothing of how skeptical I am that the AI could have such the global control they had, and yet Towasa and co. were still able to create the outside series seemingly without issue. This anime is trying so hard to paint a big, grand picture, but it just can't find it in itself to think about the details.

There were already visible cracks in this anime's writing—cracks that were especially visible in the character writing. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised that it wasn't able to stick the landing after all. I guess it's much easier to create suspense and a sense of mystery, than to actually pull through with those promises. This isn't the first, and surely won't be the least, to promise much more than it could actually end up delivering. Still, it's disappointing all the same.

This series spent nine—arguably ten—episodes building up to this, and the payoff is horrendous. I was holding out hope that this week might finally deliver something great, but this is worse—more clumsy, more poorly thought out, and more nonsensical—than I ever could've imagined. This anime had potential, but as far as I'm concerned, this episode just confirmed that it wasn't able to put its money where its metaphorical mouth is. What a trainwreck. I try to reserve one-star ratings for episodes that are truly, actively terrible, and if this hasn't earned that stain, I don't know what else would.

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Dusk Beyond the End of the World is currently streaming on HIDIVE.