(L) Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 (BONES)

[chrno]

Just finished watching the "raw" of ep. 2. Eventually I will have to catch it now that it's subbed. That was pretty fast.

Really enjoyed ep. 2. I'm digging the designs, especially 'Mari'. And yes she does remind you of 'Balsa'. Of course my impression was 'Saya', (Terada's Saya) but then again who did 'Balsa' look like at first glance? So either way she reminded me of both. Much more 'Balsa'.

Lot's of good arguments on show and why they believe they believe. Of course some I agree with and has made me think more of things. Like why 'Mari' isn't panicking or the cake deal. Of course most of the arguments never crossed my mind because the responses were on par of what I felt made sense. I also look at this as "sacrificing one thing for another". And will the reward be greater in the end. The OP may hold clues to the ending. I'll leave it at that and leave any speculations for later. As it's too early to start thinking about what the end may hold. We're only at ep. 2. So because my mind is churning it means I'm enjoying what I see.

Oh if this hasn't been mentioned already, 'Tokyo Magnitude 8.0' airs on late nite Thursdays at 12:45-1:15. Or 0:45-1.15.

[Blaat]

I thought the second episode was excellent. I do find it amusing that Mai Nakahara, a veteran seiyuu, was doing such a minor role.

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

5. I was wondering why they could get TV but no phone connection. Maybe antennas on the FujiTV building are working, but those elsewhere are not?

Mobile TV goes via satellite unlike phoning which uses antennas.
I'm guessing Fuji TV has a backup generator, and a working dish.

[4Tran]

Originally Posted by Sylphic

I'd kindly like to remind you that Odaiba (where they are atm) is an ISLAND in the middle of the Tokyo harbour. It is only accessible by the rainbow bridge (which is ruined) and by ferry (which is clearly not running).

The people in Odaiba should be able to leave via the bridges to the east. They're probably impassable to motor traffic, but people on foot should be able to use them.

Originally Posted by Jarmel

My point about the cake is she is relaxing and eating and not being proactive about her problem. Once again it's priorities.

Mari did act according to her priorities. There's no transportation off Odaiba, and the electricity will be cut off in most of the city, so there's nothing that can be done until daybreak. I'm not sure what you expected her to do beyond that since she's not the sort of person who panics.

Originally Posted by Jarmel

I'll hold off on my assesment of damage until a few episode in but again it didn't really strike me as all hell as broken loose. Got to hand it to the engineers though for making Tokyo one of the more earthquake resistant cities. I guess I had my hopes up to high when I was thinking about New Orleans, Sri Lanka, or even 9/11 with the chaos those events caused.

Tokyo is a much much larger city than any of those other places, and so the chaos and damage should be correspondingly larger as well. It's something that we should see more of as populace start to understand the sheer intensity of the devastation.

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

5. I was wondering why they could get TV but no phone connection. Maybe antennas on the FujiTV building are working, but those elsewhere are not?

This is more a storytelling conceit than anything else. The viewers have to find out what's happening, and so we get this convenient news snippet.

Originally Posted by chrno

Oh if this hasn't been mentioned already, 'Tokyo Magnitude 8.0' airs on late nite Thursdays at 12:45-1:15. Or 0:45-1.15.

Yup. It's in the now famous noitaminA timeslot, broadcast (not by coincidence) by Fuji TV.

[Celestial Kitsune]

Episode 2 Screenshots

[Kaoru Chujo]

The seiyuu have been doing such a great job that I made a blog post with pics of them and their characters, and info about each seiyuu and some of her past roles.

[Guardian Enzo]

Bl*ck st*r! I knew I recognized that voice.

[Noe]

Well episode 2 was traumatic.

[bbee]

Great second episode. Thankfully they're not taking the disaster tourism route and showcasing the earthquake; they are still focusing on the characters and that part was again excellently done, although I liked episode 1 more. Definately the best show of the season, probably of the year, but like Guardian Enzo I've learned not to get my hopes up.
However.. The calm. The inexplicable calm..

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

1. I credit the comparative calmness to these people being Japanese, and well drilled in how to respond to an earthquake. They'd be ashamed to get too excited. And anyway, they're probably a bit in shock still.

That's one hell of a stretch. The Japanese are not all saints. Where's the looting, the screaming for a lost loved one, the mass panic and despair, people carrying dead relatives? Instead we get people calmly holding a conversation inside a half collapsed bulding amidst aftershocks, and a mass of people sitting silently while sheltering from the rain.
For a show that starts with a decaration that effort was put into realism, it's a let-down. Ep 1 was much better in that respect. Then again, it was slice-of-life and it's easy to make that realistic.

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

2. Mari is a calm person anyway, but there is literally nothing she can do besides keep trying her phone. Odaiba is cut off from the mainland, the mainland is in chaos anyway, and her home is a long way away. We'll probably see them set out on a grand journey next week.

A stretch of water is not an impassable barrier. You can swim it. She could have covered the 20KM in 5-6 hours on foot, and grabbed a flashlight somewhere if needed. Been there by nightfall.
It's not like Mirai or Yuuki were in any immediate danger after they got out, since everyone is friends and incredibly calm.

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

4. The one thing that does make me wonder is drinking water: that would be the thing everyone needs soon, but there has been no mention of it. I can understand them not stocking up in the ruined store, since they wanted to get out fast and probably hadn't thought of it.

Not an issue since it's raining. For the longer term there are likely to be facilities.

Great ep, but for lack of a hint of panic. It would have worked to explain why Mari had to stay with the children, too.

[Yuutsu]

I'm not sure I understand the parts where they included 3D models of people. Another anime did the same thing, and the characters really clashed with the environments.

As for the episode, I enjoyed it.

[Von Himmel]

After watching the second episode. . I still can't seem to like Mirai. I know that she's still a kid and her reckless behaviour to find her brother is logical in her situation...but still.....

The epicenter was around northen bay in tokyo, right ? Does that mean that we will see a tsunami ?

[Clarste]

I actually liked this episode less than the first one. A lot of it stems from the characters attitudes, which imo make them seem pretty flat. Mari is perfectly rational and always does the right thing while Mirai is perfectly irrational and always wrong. Which makes the whole thing seem like an extended "what not to do in an earthquake" commercial.

Also, it really, really annoyed me when Mirai actually found Yuuki, thus validating everything she'd done and making it seem like running randomly into danger is a good thing. Having a mature voice of reason guiding a troubled youth is a respectable story premise, if rather boring, but when you contradict your own message in the middle of the story without even addressing it, it just makes the whole thing seem pointless.

I suppose they could address it later, or perhaps the character development repercussions of it are much more subtle than I can imagine the director being. Until that happens though, my expectations for this series have dropped off sharply.

[typhonsentra]

Well no, Mirai would've died if she had stayed in the lower levels and didn't listen. She only found him because she left the original search area.

I really liked the portrayal of the disaster in this episode except for the lack of fatalities in such a situation. They probably feel having the kids see too many dead people would be too traumatizing but it's also unrealistic considering how horrible they're portraying the collapse of the building and all the fires. And through all this only one kid.

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by typhonsentra

Well no, Mirai would've died if she had stayed in the lower levels and didn't listen. She only found him because she left the original search area.

She found him when she stopped listening and ran off on her own again for the umpteenth time. The fact that listening really had been a good idea the previous times is what gives the scene its whole schizophrenic feel. I mean, she didn't learn her lesson, but this time her recklessness paid off.

Edit: I think it would've been fine and pretty in character if there to be an "I told you so" kind of scene putting tension in their relationship, but there wasn't so it just felt weird.

[Guardian Enzo]

Well, I don't really need to add a whole lot to that - the quality of the work speaks for itself. I didn't think this was quite as spectacularly good as the first episode, but it was still the second best episode of any series this summer. For a series to bring me that close to tears after an episode and a half speaks to the magnificence of the writing.

I thought the tone was struck just about right - some panic, the great sense of impending doom as the huge mass of Big Sight slowly crumbled upon itself. Mostly just people going about the business of surviving. Yuuki is truly indefatigable - it's clear now that there's a bigger difference in character between he and his sister than merely age. For his open and trusting nature she's an opposite on all fronts - angry and disappointed and self-loathing. She's going to be a hard one to love, but she's all the more real for it.

On the question of whether Mari should have been so calm, and stopped to eat cake with the siblings when she had a daughter of her own to worry about... I'm a little torn on that. She did seem a bit too blase' about that, but OTOH it's clear she's a logical and calm person and clearly realized she couldn't have gotten off Odaiba anyway. To the person who suggested she swim, well - I presume you've never been to Tokyo, because ain't nobody casually swimming from Odaiba to the mainland, especially under those circumstances. It's a long way. I suspect she'd already had her anxiety attack and come to realize she was stuck for now, so she might as well help where she could - remember that somewhere north of 4 hours have passed since the quake by the time they sheltered from the rain with the others.

[Kaoru Chujo]

Originally Posted by bbee

...[re my suggestion that the people are orderly because they're Japanese]The Japanese are not all saints. Where's the looting, the screaming for a lost loved one, the mass panic and despair, people carrying dead relatives? Instead we get people calmly holding a conversation inside a half collapsed bulding amidst aftershocks, and a mass of people sitting silently while sheltering from the rain.....
[questioning why Mari didn't rush toward home]A stretch of water is not an impassable barrier. You can swim it. She could have covered the 20KM in 5-6 hours on foot, and grabbed a flashlight somewhere if needed. Been there by nightfall. It's not like Mirai or Yuuki were in any immediate danger after they got out, since everyone is friends and incredibly calm.

Thanks for taking my points seriously. I think you're right about the rain providing moisture and drinking water being soon available. But as for the point about panic and disorder, I really do think the Japanese are the most orderly and law-abiding people on the planet. Not the nicest or best or anything saintly, just orderly and law-abiding. And the people filing out of Marine Plaza seemed to me to be in shock, putting one foot in front of the other. Anyway, the absence of panic seemed reasonable to me.

As for Mari swimming home, that seems pretty extreme. And maybe not needed, since her mother is there with her daughter. She may be being gnawed away by anxiety inside, but maybe she is a person who is able to overcome that and stay calm. Your point is resonable, but anyway it didn't bother me. We'll see as we go on whether her character makes sense. I hope that all the producers' research wasn't just into the physical effects of an earthquake, but into how people react to it psychologically, too.

Originally Posted by Clarste

...Also, it really, really annoyed me when Mirai actually found Yuuki, thus validating everything she'd done and making it seem like running randomly into danger is a good thing. Having a mature voice of reason guiding a troubled youth is a respectable story premise, if rather boring, but when you contradict your own message in the middle of the story without even addressing it, it just makes the whole thing seem pointless....

I may be mistaking your intention, but why does all drama have to be didactic? Why does the story have to have a "message" like that? How about a troubled youth guiding a voice of reason? Or the fact that life can actually be contradictory? Anyway, I do not require that everybody always do what is best, or that people be punished for their mistakes. Not all anime have to be educational children's literature. (This is one of my disagreements with a lot of anime criticism.)

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Kaoru Chujo

I may be mistaking your intention, but why does all drama have to be didactic? Why does the story have to have a "message" like that? How about a troubled youth guiding a voice of reason? Or the fact that life can actually be contradictory? Anyway, I do not require that everybody always do what is best, or that people be punished for their mistakes. Not all anime have to be educational children's literature. (This is one of my disagreements with a lot of anime criticism.)

I can understand that. My first paragraph was set up to explain that that's exactly what this anime was setting itself up as, and then it broke its own rules with no fanfare. It seems to me that it can't decide whether it wants to be didactic or not and that's the problem.

To put it another way, it would be realistic if good actions aren't always rewarded and vice versa. The show has not made any effort whatsoever to make its characters realistic though. Mirai does everything wrong, and Mari is always right.

[Guardian Enzo]

This series is lighting up the English language blogosphere big-time - seems like everyone is blogging it, just about. I'll be interested in seeing how it plays over time, both here and in Japan.

[donoghu]

Now that I have seen the 2nd episode, I guess I got an idea about what's about to come.

My guess is that, actually, this anime show won't be about "surviving" or "humanity in crisis", but more like a show about a group who's trying to move out of a natural desaster.

So, in other words, my guess is about this show being a "simulation" about natural desasters emergencies in Tokyo.
So we'll see only a little about the "psychology" that can come out, in people crazy minds, once it's free from its bounds.

[drobertbaker]

Ms. Takigawa the newscaster said:
『地震の規模しましたマグニチュのは八点...』
jishin no kibo shimashita magunichu no wa hachi ten...
The scale of the earthquake made a magnitude of 8 point...

マグニチュード magunichudo is used to refer to a Richter number.
震度 - しんど - shindo is used to refer to a Shindo number.

But she gives a fixed radius (25 km) which is characteristic of the Shindo taxonomy.

In which case, although the 8.0 effect from a quake centered in (the middle of) Toyko Bay with a radius of 25 km would extend only a few km onto the land (including Odaiba), surrounding areas would still experience severe, though lesser, damage.

Mari's home would be about 28 km from the epicenter, closer than the kids' at about 32 km. Definitely in the radius of concern. She is amazingly cool and clearheaded, judging from my experience of single mothers. She seems to be surrogating on these kids. And they will be headed to the same area.

I am amazed to discover that Japan has moody, cynical, whiny, annoying, tweenagers! Where have they been hiding them all these years? Or is this a recent phenomenon, like NEETs?

The scenic and almost photo-realistic portrayal of Odaiba also reminds me of the similar treatment of Washington, D.C. at the start of Higashi no Eden. This show is certainly a worthy successor in the timeslot. Who'd have thought it?

[SuperKnuckles]

Hmm... no Lord of the Flies just yet, but we'll see how it goes from here.

Especially for a nation TOTALLY reliant on electronics and cellphones, it'd be like seeing Vulcans in Klingon now.