From The New World – A Whole Society Gone Wrong

Man, this show. This is yet another show that I’ve watched a decade ago yet still remember a lot about it. So, I am grateful for watching it again for #AniTwitWatches recently. This was yet another fun one led by a certain Jon Spencer. I have talked about this fun event on twitter before, but if you have a twitter account and want to watch some anime with a few people and possibly discuss it with other people, then follow Jon Spencer to look forward into all of these in the future because he does post when we do it. We are near the end of Astra Lost in Space right now, but there will be another one in the future because this watching tour keeps going on and on here. At a hole here, From the New World was such a fun experience for all of us here even with it being as heavy as it is.

So, what is From the New World? It’s a post apocalyptic series centered on a future of human society of psychic people who control a race of monster rats. In our own world time period, one person developed psychic powers and started blowing everything up which leads to this more rural society in the future. A future where kids are heavily tested through out their school lives on whether or not they are thoughtful or restrained enough to exist in society. Plus, there are the monster rats that are obviously more relevant than you think here. It’s a very harsh world that our protagonist Saki, her best mates Satoru, Mamoru, Maria, and Shun have to travel with very low success of them making it through. Even if this group, a group that is given all the benefits that others aren’t, they still live in Kamisu 66 with every bit of living and indoctrination they are in.

I’m just going to say it right now, the characters in this story are pretty boring to me. All of them are characters that are built to show this world. Saki is the main character of the show and she is a focal point for our journey into the show from her elementary school days to the last of her high school days to her as a young adult. In each time period, she is given some time to live in the very constrained society in school, adventures with her friends and Satoru while keeping him calm during his feelings of power, the very complicated meetings with the monster rats as they develop technology under the not watchful eyes of people they call god lead by a guy name Squealer who is the best character, and other complex plots and issues. All of this leading to the tragedy that will hit Kamisu 66 in the end of the series. What tragedy? Can you guess from what I told you or why I mentioned the monster rats?

From The New World is a very interesting series to watch in 2021, an era where we are still faced with all sorts of political drama of now and some isolation due to the pandemic that is still here. It has that tension. This show has tons of years of stress following what is wondering what happens from this society created when any kid can be a psychic nuclear bomb if they don’t pass the tests. Same with the Monster Rats themselves being so pushed against. Even our kids, who are supposed to be the most freedom, are told to look down on the Monster Rats, on children who don’t follow rules, on how variances in children are wrong, and so many other things. The city if Kamisu 66 is a wonderful character that is full of complex issues and the series knows that and sells it well. Our character named Saki can only hope for a change because society was messed up long ago and it will take a while to fix. Does this sound familiar to anyone? What could I be referring to? I don’t know.

Besides the characters of this story, on a writing level, there really isn’t that many problems for me honestly. There are elements that are only mentioned or unexplained, but I always liked all of those for the fact that there are things in that world that still go beyond explanation. It is a magical world beyond the confines of the world they are in and they aren’t told about them because everyone is afraid of it. I can say the same about the supposed queer baiting here too of which its not. Especially since feelings that developed from the relationships between same sex characters matters still deep into adult hood. The final couple that happens is a result of “well, I guess we have to because it’s societally mandated for us to have kids”. The powers of that world are interesting as people learn more about what they can do, so it’s nice to see people get their own defined power. A lot of thought was put into the show and I love that fact.

On a visual level, From the New World is all over the place. There are some excellent shots of some of the most artistic things you will ever see in anime or at least in competition for that. Tons of different color, representations of abstract shots, very cool displays of psychic powers as it bends people around, and things like that. Very excellent in their execution as well to create the stressful mood the show wants you to live in. Then, there is the awful cg, some off model shots that were unsure of whether or not they were on purpose. Completely unsure about that fact but I feel like some were just mistakes. On the positive side, the clothing in this show is just so good. So much distinctive perspectives here too. So a bit mixed in general, but the show was effectively able to tell the whole story of the whole thing here.

So yes, I’ve not been very detailed into the anime itself because I think that this is one that a person needs to explore themselves. It’s a very solid anime in which the reveals should be felt as time goes on because it creates that sort of world you can live in, though really wouldn’t want to. From The New World does a fantastic job of selling the society of the show from the ground up to see all of it. A great letter of hope of people seeing what society is and how they can change it and everything else. An uncertain future, but one that can mean so many things. It can go backwards, forwards, or in-between. Does that sound familiar too? Well, who knows? Hmmm. So yes, this is a solid watch.