Yatterman Night

Episode 4

Last week I said that Yatterman Night excelled at tonal shifts, and this week, it gave itself the ultimate test. Episode 4 started out as a lighthearted comedy, with a title (and a few scenes) that made it sound like a hot springs episode. There were monkeys! And the boys wore monkey masks when they tried to peep on the girls! And there was slapstick! And noodle soup that even the Honorable Oda got to eat!

Then, around the halfway mark, it turned on a dime. Mitchan, one of the villagers sheltering the Doronbow gang this week, is pregnant, and about to give birth any day now. Regardless, the Yatterman robots summon her husband for 35 years' hard labor in Yatter Metropolis. Not only is the couple powerless to challenge it, they have to pretend it's an honor. The robots haul her husband away as Mitchan cheers with a forced smile, tears streaming down her face. It only escalates as we meet one of the actual humans behind the Yatterman regime, and he attacks our heroes full-throttle.

It doesn't work quite as well as last week, but it still works. This is the first major blow to Leopard's innocence. The Yatterman citizens are oppressed too, and their fidelity to the government is borne out of fear rather than malice. The Yatter Kingdom isn't the shiny Promised Land she expected. On the contrary, her homeland seems like a heaven next to its hell, even with its lack of resources. The Yatter citizens aren't doing so well anyway (food shortages), so is their slight leg up worth the oppression? They have no control over their own destinies, knowing the government could drag them away at any moment. At least Leopard gets to choose the direction of her future, even if it's a tough road to get there. This realization motivates her to a cause larger than herself and her friends; The Yatter Kingdom needs to change on a root level, not just let them in.

It helped her (and the audience) to see an actual human face behind this menace. We're introduced to General Goro, a member of the Yatter government who pilots a Yatterwan. I thought it was notable that instead of resembling the original show's heroes in any way, he's a generic bishie anime villain. If this guy is the one directing the forces, something's seriously wrong with the Yatterman legacy. He may have a Yatterwan to ride around in, but he hardly embodies the spirit of the original team. His appearance means an upgrade in fight scenes, too. The soft outlines of the character designs allows for some gorgeously fluid animation. I like watching the characters dissolve into colorful blurs as they swerve around, like in Goro and Elephantus' sword fight. The series' whole visual design was in top form this week. The background environments are some of my favorite of the winter season. Yatterman Night has stuck to its blue-green woodsy palette for the past three episodes, but it's used well. The show reliably communicates whether the woods should feel homey or scary—and this episode had plenty of both tones.

This week's episode wasn't as strong standalone as the previous three were. It feels a little like two separate episodes mashed into one. Yet, it's a forceful push in moving the plot forward, and likely a pivotal moment in the series as a whole. Doronbow and their allies have begun their adventure in earnest now. They're not just fighting for themselves, but for the whole of the Yatter Kingdom.

Rating: B+

Yatterman Night is currently streaming on Funimation.

Rose is a musicologist who studies film music. She writes about anime and many other topics on Autostraddle.com, her blog and her Twitter.
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