#darkest symphony

i also really enjoy nagai kei as a character? he’s an asshole, and sassy with a sharp tongue and intelligent. and although he doesnt particularly have a strong body / good at physical activities, he makes it up with his brains and quick thinking. moreover, i really enjoy how apathetic he is as a character. he literally doesnt care about anyone other than himself. i still remember that bit where a nice human tried to help kei but when he died, all he thought was ‘aww, he died. time to run i guess’. he doesnt care and i think he’s very fascinating to watch!

the fact that his character also influences his ibm is also something that i appreciate. which the sass and how dick-ish he is, it makes sense that even his ibm will refuse to listen to him. 

furthermore, his r/s with the other characters are fun to watch too; he treats them so differently! we see how he appreciates kaito and pushes him away at the same time, bc despite the fact that he’s cold to many, he very clearly does care about kaito ( who won’t tbh? he’s such a sweetheart and i really cant wait to see him show up again in the manga ). and then there’s kou, where he constantly sighs bc kou is such a dumb and he cannot deal with his stupidity. the moments where he simply just disregards the naivety of his words (eg here) is absolutely hilarious to watch.

it doesnt help that his voice actor is mamo-chan and we both know how much i love him. usually his characters are either the popular, charismatic ( ouran’s tamaki ) or a completely joke / crazy ( tg’s tsukiyama ) and hearing him act as kei is very different from what he usually does and i really enjoyed the constant irritation in his voice!

if im talking about characters i cannot not talk about satou because as much as i love kei, the star of the series is undoubtedly satou. villains whose motives are simply to have fun have been done maybe a thousand times and usually it ends up making the villains dull, and evil for the sake of being evil. but satou is different! firstly, how often do you see a villain be an old man? and for once, i actually get how charismatic a villain is. his ploy… pushing the wheelchair… announcing to the entire world that he’s an ajin and with tear-filled eyes, tells the world how cruel ajin are being treated… it’s the fact that he’s an old man that makes it even more convincing.

not to mention, if kei is smart, satou is insane. ive never seen an anime character as old as satou have that much agility. and heck, he uses the fact that he’s an ajin to do absolutely crazy things. literally killing himself in order to play the game. okay this part is only in the manga, but heck, he literally cut his own hand and made them into like chicken wings to be sent to the location where he will infiltrate next and then throw himself into the shredder or whatever it is so that his body will start forming where his biggest body part is– ie his hands. that is downright crazy. and then there’s this!!

there are so many moments where i legit just covered my mouth because of the mind games kei and satou are having and how they outsmart each other in ways that are utterly inconceivable. so yee i really like it a lot! 

i also particularly like the discussion of ‘what is death’ for ajin, who essentially cannot die. it brings up a whole new perspective. because arent you the same person if you have the exact same memories and experiences? but there comes a discussion that since your brain is where your thought processes and memories are and hence the very thing that forms your own individuality… if your head gets destroyed and its a different brain that is doing the thinking… arent you already dead? and you’re an entirely different person now.

which makes satou even more of a beast, bc he literally doesnt care if he did die in the ajin way. he just wants to have fun. and for that, he doesnt care if his comrades even betrays him because he’ll just see it as another obstacle – a new difficulty in his game.

lots of people dont watch ajin bc of the choice in 3d animation which i agree can be jarring and awkward to watch at first but once you get used to it i dont think its that bad. but then again, recently i came to realise that i dont really care that much for aesthetics because apparently some people do care a lot. but what i do care about is characterisation & plot. but either way i liked the choice in 3d animation. its because i think using 3d to animate ibm is a good choice and for them to go all the way in using 3d in the characters and such would make the ibms look more natural.