Futakoi Alternative (Review)
When three’s not a crowd
You may have noticed that since I randomly sampled a bit of Futakoi Alternative, I haven’t posted much. That’s because I’ve been watching it. On recommendations from Kabitzin and TheBigN, I dove headlong into what turned out to be one of the best series I’ve seen in quite some time.
Story
In Futakoi Alternative, which takes place in the same female-twin-infested universe as an (apparently crappy) harem series called Futakoi, Rentarou Futabo inherits a detective agency from his father and operates it with his young twin assistants. It’s not exactly a normal premise in itself, but add in crooked cops, a tofu salesman obsessed with crawfish, a Yakuza boss with a Mazinger Z fist, a vast underground conspiracy involving humanoid squid, and an arranged marriage in a castle in Germany, and shit starts to go all over the place.
Nearly every episode bounces around chronologically. At first, that’s a little disorienting and just a smidge confusing, but in the end this method works wonders for the emotional impact of the story.
Characters
Characters are foremost in driving Futakoi Alternative’s 13 episodes, especially Rentarou. He’s one of anime’s finest male leads — neither a spineless harem loser who can’t make up his mind about what he wants, nor an emotionless caricature of manliness. He’s a regular guy who you get to watch grow from a somewhat indecisive kid to a young man who takes things into consideration before ultimately tackling his problems head-on. The main theme of Alternative has more to do with Rentarou accepting who he is, and what it means to be his father’s son, than it does with squid conspiracies. He does, however, smoke a cigarette in one drag during an especially awesome scene, and if you think that’s great, you’re right.
Sara and Soujyu, the twins, aren’t as deeply characterized but they’re not one-dimensional moe shortcuts either. Sara’s strength and unhesitating decision-making are the trigger for the second half of the plot, and the vulnerability she ultimately shows is the ironic product of her unwavering resilience. By the same token, Soujyu, the shy and accomodating one, gains a quiet and believable strength in that second half.
Side characters aren’t very well-developed at all, but they are highly entertaining and more than serve their purpose, especially the crawfish-catching Gen.
Animation & Music
Alternative has some of the best background music I’ve seen in a TV anime. It almost always enhances the mood greatly, and anyone who’s seen it should probably identify with the words “disco fight scene.” Animation (by ufotable with flag and feel.) is capable and never drops in quality, but the directing goes far beyond the call of duty. Action sequences are over-the-top and frequently resemble Kazuya Tsurumaki’s wacked-out FLCL, while the more melancholy stuff can be gut-wrenching without slipping into Key-style melodrama.
Vibe
I have to mention that one of Futakoi Alternative’s greatest strengths (if not the greatest) is its constantly-shifting mood. The first half is manic, hilarious, and action-packed. We get a bit of angst off Rentarou as everyone including the spectre of his dead father pressures him to be something. But overall, it’s a free and easy (if very wild) time. You feel as if there can’t be more fun packed into 20 minutes. Then, abruptly, the second half cuts a wide gash through your fun, just as it does with the characters. That manic energy is ripped away and replaced by alternating sweet sadness and hopeless desperation. By the time the middle of the story starts winding into the end, the only happiness the characters have seen for weeks was in their own bizarre and delusional fantasies. But by the end of the story, frenetic action and laughs are back, augmented this time by a fist-pumping “fuck yeah” factor that would make Simon and Kamina proud.
Bottom Line
Just watch it. It’s got brains, balls, and heart. And, it’s got something for almost everyone: romance lovers, missile spam fetishists, FLCL fans, and even bigamists. I would love to own the show, but it seems unlikely at this point that we’ll get a license for R1 and I’m almost never willing to pay R2 DVD prices for stuff, so my enjoyment of this series is a bit bittersweet. Much of what we watch as far as TV anime is throwaway, even the best of it, but I can see myself easily enjoying Futakoi Alternative again. I can recommend this wild ride without any hesitation.
