Paranoia Agent: Anime Genius

When was the last time you had your mind blown? When your brain was doing full on summersaults because of what you had just watched or heard? During Donnie Darko maybe? or back in 99 when The Matrix was released? Its a sensation that unfortunately comes along only too rarely. For me it came recently in the most unexpected place from a genre that I really didn't think had many surprises left for me.

                                            

Due to sites like Veoh.com and Youtube you can now catch many TV shows online. These sites are also useful for the casual anime fan as they have many fan-subs (shows direct from Japan which have been subtitled by dedicated western otaku). This means you can watch anime episodes for free and avoid paying the hefty £20 price tag for a DVD with four episodes amounting to a running time of just over an hour. Its expensive to be a hardcore anime fan which is why I have never really got into all the series that are out there on DVD. If you have a high speed broadband connection now your laughing.  During the anime boom of the early 1990s though I loved watching Akira, Ghost in the Shell, Dominion Tank Police and in particular Fist of the North Star which was like all adolescent boys perfect films rolled into one. Recently I borrowed the anime series Samurai 7 from my brother and enjoyed it immensely which made me resent the hefty price tags on the DVDs. On lazy Saturday afternoons I often find myself checking out what is available on line and after getting bored of Elfen Lied I decided to check out the first episode of Paranoia Agent. I had heard of this series prior to watching it as I knew it was by Satoshi Kon who made the critically acclaimed Perfect Blue.

I was intrigued throughout the first episode but not amazed and it was probably the soundtrack and beginning and end credits that appealed most at that stage as it was strange and otherworldly. I was interested in it enough though to keep watching however I couldn't get the next episodes to load and so forgot about it until I was asked what I wanted for my birthday. A cool thing that some labels have started to do is release anime series in collected box sets which are affordable at 40 quid and lo and behold Paranoia Agent had been released as box set. I got through all 13 episodes in 3 days and really didn't want it to end. It reminded me of the first time I watched Twin Peaks when it was on TV back in 1990, which was incidentally the first time my young 12 year old mind was blown.

Paranoia Agent is truly a series that is a shining example of the best in the anime genre and challenges your preconceptions of what an anime series should be. This is a series that truly deserves a wider audience which is why I am covering it here. The story is set in Tokyo and follows a number of individuals who are all attacked by an ugly, creepy looking child on gold rollerblades armed with a twisted gold baseball bat. In the first episode we meet an artist named Tsukiko. Tsukiko is the creator of a popular cute dog named Maromi (think Hello Kitty except a pink dog) who is about to become huge thanks to the debut of a Maromi anime series. The company she works for is pressuring Tsukiko to come up with a new equally popular character and she cant seem to deliver. That is when she is attacked by the kid who becomes known as Lil Slugger. The episodes that follow tell the stories of a sleazy reporter who is being sued by the family of an old man he hit with his car and placed in a coma, a popular school  kid who feels threatened by a classmate, a teacher who moonlights as a prostitute and a corrupt cop with financial woes. All of these characters are attacked by Lil Slugger.

                                           

The detectives who are assigned to the case, Ikari and Maniwa eventually work out that all the victims were attacked when they were at their most stressed and on the verge of a breakdown. A suspect is eventually arrested and Ikari thinks they have the case solved even though the suspect only claims responsibility to two of the attacks. Then they find their suspect murdered in the cell and the attacks continue.Things get darker from here as Lil Slugger becomes an urban legend and his attacks become more violent and frequent. In the midst of all this the old man who is supposedly in a coma writes long mathematic equations on the floor of the hospital car park and pops up in Maniwa's dreams to deliver cryptic messages. Tsukiko's plush version of her Maromi character also talks to her in an increasingly disturbing manner. What relation this all has to the main plot though, I'm not saying.

Ultimately Paranoia Agent is a very clever way of telling a very human story. If you pay close attention to the opening and closing of the first and last episodes you will realise what this is all about. Kon is showing us a very surreal reflection of our lives in the modern age. Specifically the ways we deal with stress and how we relate to each other as human beings. This is a brilliant piece of work that manages to be simultaneously funny,sad,scary and moving like the best movies that make you feel several things at once.Its gripping throughout like a great drama and you forget that you are watching animated characters as its so well written. In my opinion Satoshi Kon has transcended the anime director label here to become one of the most interesting directors working today. For further proof of this check out his previous films Perfect Blue, Millennium Actress, Tokyo Godfathers and the upcoming Paprika. All of these films couldn't be more different from each other and are beautifully written and animated.

                                         

If you enjoyed Twin Peaks or currently love Lost and are looking for something similar that's under the radar then get over your pre-conceptions of Anime and give this a try. It surely won't be long before some savvy American TV network buys the rights to this and produces a live action series remake which becomes a huge phenomenon.