PokeNirvash Posted December 4, 2020 Share Posted December 4, 2020 (edited) Lost media is one of my most recent interests, and while I don’t obsess over it as much as others do, I will admit that I can see where these obsessers are coming from. Entertainment that was once readily available for consumption, lost to time for various reasons… There’s something romantic about chasing after something that might not even be tangible, either for the sake of proving its existence, taking possession of it so you know it exists, or putting it out there for the entire world to see. And when that lost media is made available, it’s all the better, even if what’s found objectively sucks. I mean, that hasn’t stopped me from watching AWOL after the English-subbed 12-episode version found its way online against the better judgement of its owner, nor has it kept me from possessing Discotek’s subtitled DVD release of Wild 7 Another, a rare non-fansubbed anime from the 2000s whose new English translation can’t even be found on KissAnime or its contemporaries. While I’ve never chased down lost media to the lengths others have, I hold a connection to that medium regardless. I own a few pieces of potential lost media, mostly in the form of VHS recordings of ads from Cartoon Network and [adult swim] that haven’t seen upload to YouTube or archive.org just yet. The special one-minute ad for The Animatrix’s October 30th, 2004 rerun on [as] is my favorite of the bunch. But even stranger than that, I’m actually the creator of a piece of lost media that most people don’t even know about. Only those who browsed the [adult swim] Message Boards in the early 2010s may know what I’m talking about, assuming the few who do haven’t already forgotten. The lost media I created is called Kiguma, and I am going to tell you all that I can about it, about five years after it escaped my grasp. To avoid cluttering the page too much, and also to keep certain facts hidden for some people who'd rather not remember such things, the different sections of this message board essay of mine will be hidden under spoiler tabs, so if you're curious to learn all the ugly details, just look under them to learn said details in the fullest description in which I could give them. THE ORIGINS Spoiler Put in the simplest of terms, Kiguma is a “hypothetical anime”, a term I coined referring to works of either original fiction or fan fiction written in such a manner that reading a chapter/installment is like watching an episode of an anime. Other aspects include content being timed out to mentally run for around 20 minutes, the average length of an anime episode, and supplementary content consisting of hypothetical staff and cast lists for if it were an actual anime. The two most prominent examples of “hypothetical anime” I’ve created that I bring up nowadays are NIBAI MUGENDAI, the first hypothetical anime I committed myself to and still hold dear to me even when I’m working on other stuff, and Kinky Kunoichi, the first hypothetical anime I actually completed from start to finish and released on a schedule akin to a realistic anime season, in its case the Fall 2018 season. There are others that I’ve planned and/or written, but apart from Kiguma, they aren’t as important. Much like NIBAI MUGENDAI in its earlier stages when I used to bug everyone to read it like the little online shitlord I was in middle/high school, Kiguma was released on the ASMB’s Action Discussion board, namely the sub-board used for fan fiction and the like. But unlike NIBAI MUGENDAI, I decided to structure Kiguma in a manner such that, instead of doing all the worldbuilding and character prepwork by myself, I did so with help from the community, who provided original characters designed for the Kiguma universe that I could use as I saw fit. Might sound weird and kinda tabletop roleplay-ey by today’s standards, but this was actually common on the ASMB at that time. Likely inspired by the community fanfic La Revolution, written works in the AD Fanfiction forum had authors either post character submissions that could be used for the story, or allow themselves to be used as the basis for characters of the author’s own creation. While some fictions like La Revolution or the anime parody/rip-off Waffles followed the latter approach, the former was more often than not the rule. Like most who partook in these character creation processes, I was included in both methods. But again, being a shitlord that drew ire from many individuals present in that day and age, my characters weren’t exactly treated the best. My first AD fanfic character, La Revolution’s Shipon Kaaba, was only featured in two chapters of the epic; the first being a forgettable hackjob that I wrote and posted immediately after getting permission to try my hand at one, and the second featuring her failing to kill someone semi-important, throwing a tantrum over it, and dying an undignified death at their hands. I tried retconning it with a bonus chapter that revealed she lived, but it was rejected as non-canon. For what it’s worth, I got resident character illustrator Kohikki to draw four different images of Shipon, one of which still sees use on MyAnimeList as my profile image, so there’s that. Other characters of my own creation but others’ whims fared better, but ran the gamut from forgettable (the genderbending Geass girl I submitted for the “Code Geass characters and OCs in grade school” fanfic, who spent most of her time on the sidelines or in the background) to disappointing (the yakuza’s daughter I submitted for a Death Note alt fic, who died before she could even do anything) to insulting (the Japanese exchange student for the “haunted house survival horror” fic, who wound up speaking in broken English and cannibalizing her “love interest”, yet ironically got the least brutal death out of anyone) to outright unused (the three characters I submitted for Kohikki’s short-lived webcomic La Valse de Reves). The most favorable portrayal any character representing myself got was my analogue for Waffles, the kid brother of one of the key supporting characters whose gimmick was giving content ratings to whatever media or objectionable content he interacted with. He also had a romance with another character that, like him, was a ghost in an artificial body they could use to continue living on Earth; a romance I actually helped develop after noticing that his love interest’s body looked like an older version of his previous “alive” form and vice versa, and, considering he was introduced as his sister’s younger sister and his love interest originally a guy, meant the both of them were accidental transsexuals. (How progressive!) And that was all the effort of one of the two authors, who actually took my suggestions to heart and made something surprisingly deep out of it; the other one hated my guts, exactly because I wouldn’t stop advertising NIBAI MUGENDAI in his thread in a futile attempt to get more feedback on it. That’s enough cringe-reminiscing for now. Point is, I was always on the one side of the character submission game, so when I decided to start writing Kiguma, I thought to get in on the game from the other side, being the author who could use others’ characters just as previous authors have used mine. I accepted all entries, organized them in a natural manner of introduction and involvement, and combining that with what I provided myself for the series, I was all set to start on what would be my second hypothetical anime, and the first one that I treated borderline-realistically, compared to the 29-minute maximum runtimes I gave NIBAI MUGENDAI’s later episodes… THE HYPOTHETICALS Spoiler When I first conceived of the idea for Kiguma, back before I thought to use the character submission method, my plan was to write it like a 2-hour movie. That basic format soon expanded to a 6-episode OVA, then a 12-episode TV series, then a 24-episode TV series. As I wrote it, Kiguma used the 24-episode method, though it ultimately wound up 12 in the end. As with all of my hypothetical anime, I credited myself with original creator and series composition/scripts, but in a narcissistic move that I would happily take back if I could – especially now that I use the “directorial analysis” method for my hypothetical anime – I also credited myself as the director. The animation was credited to BONES and Kinema Citrus, who collaborated in 2009 on the first Eureka seveN movie and the TV series Tokyo Magnitude 8.0. While this was before I declared Eureka seveN my all-time favorite anime, I still liked it enough to want to give Kiguma a similar animated aesthetic. Character designs were credited to Kohikki, who only drew his three character submissions in actuality, with Toshihiro Kikuchi (Yozakura Quartet’s 2008 adaptation, VitaminX Addiction) adapting them for animation. Background art alternated between studios KUSANAGI (before it started outsourcing most of its work to Vietnam), GREEN (now defunct with much of its staff now at Studio Naya, who outsourced much of its work to China), and Stereotype Smartile (now known simply as Smartile); digital painting was handled by Wish; photography by T2 Studio; and full-episode outsource work to BONES-affiliated studios of the time including A-1 Pictures, Yuhodo, C2C and Nomad. Regarding music, my favorite part of the hypothetical anime staffing process, I credited the original soundtrack to Denki Groove instrumentalist Takkyu Ishino, creating numerous original tunes I played in my head while writing scenes, and even inserting some of his existing tracks into certain sequences to give readers a gist of his musical stylings. Later insert songs were provided by SUPERCAR and Asian Kung-Fu Generation. For the first eight episodes, the opening theme was “WoNdeR WomaN” by Michiko “MiChi” Sellars and the Telephones, and the ending was “butterfly swimmer” by school food punishment. For episodes 9 through 12 (planned as 9 through 16), the opening was “THE TRUTH” by UVERworld, and the ending was “24-ji” by Asian Kung-Fu Generation. The final planned themes for episodes 17 through 24 were going to be “It’s You” by Kylee for the OP, and “Kimi no Suki na Uta” by DOES for the ED. The idea was the series would “air” in 2010, the year I posted the first couple of chapters, with one-week waits between chapter releases. As this was before I learned that it was better to have a stockpile of chapters to release on a one-a-week schedule than to spend one week writing new material from scratch like a manga author, that plan only stuck for the first two episodes, and I wound up spreading the releases out from 2010 to 2012, maybe 2013, before putting everything on hold partway through my writing of chapter 13, which was around the time everyone reading lost interest in both the story and AD fics in general. THE STORY Spoiler Kiguma takes place in an alternate version of Japan in the year 2012, roughly ten years after the nation’s government was deposed/restructured by a radical yet anti-anarchist group known as Ryudis. Life in Japan under Ryudis isn’t much different than it was under the previous regime, but there are multiple aspects that are vastly different. A giant skyscraper housing the Ryudis government now sits in the center of Tokyo, dominating the city’s skyline; the JSDF and its offshoots were restructured into an army under Ryudis’s command dedicated to protecting the nation from internal and external threats; and abandoned and wrecked areas are commonplace in the nation’s more rural portions, the result of missions enacted by the Ryudis army and its special forces, unofficially called the RSF for reasons of convenience and placeholding. One late afternoon in 2011, a bright beam of light erupts from the center of the Ryudis Governmental Building, lasting about a minute in presence but disappearing shortly thereafter. Despite no observed casualties, the beam of light is measured to have enough power to obliterate anything in its path, and travels beyond observable limits at speeds exceeding that of ordinary light. For these reasons, the light beam’s presence is thereafter known as the “Destroy Event”. Not much aftermath comes about following the Destroy Event, save for an official statement by Ryudis leader and current prime minister Teppei Kataoka that following the Event’s occurrence, something known only as “Kiguma” was discovered. No further details are officially revealed concerning what the Kiguma is or what it does, but while most people forget about it as they go on with their lives, rumors start to circulate around the one-year anniversary of the Destroy Event that the Kiguma is capable of granting the wishes of those who find it. These rumors pique the interest of Toshio Katsurada, a high school-age boy living a nomadic lifestyle. While bumming around in a warehouse in Niigata, he decides to pursue the Kiguma based on these rumors, recruiting numerous individuals who have reasons of their own to use the Kiguma as well, no matter how big or small. Calling this rag-tag group the “Kiguma Seekers Union” or "Kikyuuren", Toshio leads the way on a gradual trek across Japan from Niigata to Tokyo, with the goal of reaching the Kiguma and using it to achieve everyone’s respective wishes. However, Toshio has a secret: his body houses another persona, or rather, another person. This person is a young woman in her late teens to early 20s with blue hair done up in a ponytail, dressed in a black tanktop, cargo pants, combat boots and a dog collar, and wielding a sniper rifle she has perfect control over. This girl, who calls herself Shiho, shares a body with Toshio Birdy the Mighty-style, coming out whenever he’s under high emotional duress and only relinquishing control over their shared body 24 hours after she’s called out, no matter the circumstance. Shiho acts as the Kikyuuren’s bodyguard and interim leader throughout the group’s travels, though her presence often causes trouble for the Kikyuuren’s members in two ways. The first: the three members of the RSF are targeting Shiho under direct orders from Kataoka, resulting in numerous skirmishes between the two forces throughout the journey to Tokyo. The second: Shiho develops a masochistic crush on one of the Kikyuuren’s female members, drummer and reluctant tagalong Hekireki Enzeru, the persistence and intensity of which provides plenty of embarrassment for much of the rest of the Kikyuuren. Kiguma is an action-adventure series following Toshio/Shiho as they travel Japan in search of the Kiguma, recruiting members into the Kikyuuren as they go from town to town, city to city, and getting into skirmishes with the RSF along the way. A secondary plot forms partway through where the RSF begin to question the reasons behind their mission to eliminate Shiho, which are tied to an incident known as the Saitama Massacre, and if their efforts are really enough to ensure their success. The main draw, I feel, to the series are the mysteries behind not just what the Kiguma is, but Toshio and Shiho as well; what is their relation, what led them to share the same body, and what motivations are driving their equal insistence on reaching the Kiguma no matter what lengths Ryudis and the RSF go to in order to stop them? Each episode, minus the first and last, starts with a 30-second cold open recap consisting of one of the characters describing the events of the previous episode, often with reference to the Destroy Event and the Kiguma’s discovery. The next episode previews take a 15-second format, also narrated by one of the characters, starting out generic but taking on a horoscope-like quality from episode 4’s preview onwards. I can’t remember what the episodes were referred to as (i.e. NIBAI MUGENDAI’s as “tracks”, Kinky Kunoichi’s as “jams”), but I’m sure it was something music related. If not, then it was probably generic. THE CHARACTERS Spoiler The characters of Kiguma are divided into three groups: the Kiguma Seekers Union, the Ryudis government staff, and the members of the RSF. Instead of going through each one by one, I’ll start with the main characters; the only ones exempt from the character submission process. Toshio Katsurada (“voiced” by Toshiyuki Toyonaga in Japanese, Johnny Yong Bosch in English) is the main character apparent of Kiguma. A high school-age boy with shaggy brown hair, glasses, and casual clothes who lives like a nomad, hunkering down in rarely occupied buildings at best and houses abandoned in the aftermath of various skirmishes instigated by Ryudis at worst. He puts up the front of being a devil-may-care shitlord, deciding courses of action for the Kikyuuren without their input, making casual attempts at convincing them to go along, and overall acting a mix of indifferent and smug. In truth, he’s emotionally fragile, his shell cracking the moment he’s faced with peril, be it as major as an RSF attack or minor like a mean drunk confronting him randomly. But even at his most vulnerable, he shrouds his actions and intentions in mystery, making him a difficult read for even those who know him well. On the other hand, Shiho (Ai Shimizu/Philece Sampler), the real main character, is much more genuine than Toshio on a consistent basis, but just as two-faced when it comes to personality. She’s brave, capable, and refuses to give up even when the chips are down, giving her much more of a spine than Toshio at his snarkiest. Yet at the same time, she’s just as wacky as she is serious, said wackiness taking the form of her masochism and the attraction to Hekireki that allows it to come to the forefront. Much like the serious mysteries surrounding her and Toshio, her reasons for being in love with Hekireki despite the latter’s vehement dislike of her are likely to raise questions and possibly fuel theories. But for as much as she enjoys being abused by Hekireki, Shiho desires praise from her above all else, so she tries to balance the horny side of her with moments of believable human interaction that are typically given the cold shoulder. She manages to get along well with the rest of the Kikyuuren, proving more persuasive than Toshio at times, though they’re just as prone to disapproval of her antics as anyone else. And then there’s Teppei Kataoka (Norio Wakamoto/Michael McConnohie), the founder and leader of Ryudis, and current Prime Minister of Japan. Though he’s technically the primary antagonist, he doesn’t get much facetime for himself throughout the series, serving mostly as the commander of Ryudis and the higher-up the RSF, the true key antagonists, answer to. The closest he gets is episode 12, where he’s confronted on his recent inability to get the RSF to succeed in their missions by members of his cabinet, showing a weakness in action that isn’t normally seen when he’s at the forefront. Honestly, I feel I could’ve done more with him than I did. Reception of these three, like with most of my character submissions, was lukewarm from what I remember. Toshio and Shiho were both seen as creeps, the former for his invasive means of getting in contact with the initial Kikyuuren members and the latter for her “clingy one-sided lesbian admirer painslut” shtick, and Kataoka was hardly mentioned at all, further proving that he was more of a means to move the plot along than a character in his own right. However, Shiho’s saner actions were positively received, so I was doing something right with her, just not everything that could’ve been done right. With those three out of the way, let’s start with the members of the Kikyuuren. I only remember some of their names, so for the rest, I’ll be using placeholders without surnames. The main three Kikyuuren members, and some of the first to join, are the three members of the amateur techno-pop group OH DADDY: Johnny Ishimura (Daisuke Ono/Ezra Weisz), a Westaboo for British rock music who started the band to compensate for missing out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to travel to England, acting as its leader and keyboardist; Hekireki Enzeru (Fumiko Orikasa/Michelle Ruff), Johnny’s cousin who started the band with him to help him get it off the ground, playing drums under the stage name “Consuela”; and Kujo Nakata (Katsuyuki Konishi/Steve Blum), some dude who showed up at their first practice at random and started hanging out with them since, playing lead guitar. Of these three, Johnny is the only one who sees any benefit from joining Toshio on his journey, wanting to use the Kiguma to cure himself of his stage fright, the one big roadblock (besides no lead singer) keeping them from getting popular. Hekireki and Kujo are reluctant to come along, due to partly Toshio being a creep and partly having no real wishes they want the Kiguma to grant for them, but in the end, they reluctantly decide to go along for the ride. Writing the interactions for these three was fun, as was finding obscure British slang for Johnny to pepper his speech with to make him come off like an Anglophile, and I feel it was one of the stronger bits of Kiguma’s writing, as much as it threatened the runtime limits I set for it. The other Kikyuuren member to join alongside OH DADDY at the start is Aki Miyazaki (Tomokazu Sugita/Crispin Freeman), the son of the retired owner of a struggling sporting goods store in Niigata who’s been going about life in a rut he longs to break out of by means he’d rather not enact himself. He joins the Kikyuuren so he can use the Kiguma to give his life the change he wants, preferably in the form of a girlfriend. The original idea was for him to have a rivalry with Johnny, based on a sorta-altercation the two have in the first episode, but he ends up having the best chemistry with Shiho, to the point where one of the readers (I think it was Kohikki) shipped the two of them together, declaring it preferable to the Shiho/Hekireki pairing I was trying so desperately to push. (Again, I was still kind of a shitlord then.) The first character to join after the Kikyuuren leaves Niigata is Yuri Yoshida (Aki Toyosaki/Stephanie Sheh), a young girl from Aizuwakamatsu whose idyllic family life was brought to an end one night when she was kidnapped by yakuza, who then killed her parents after they paid her ransom. This incident mentally scarred Yuri so badly she developed a murderous split personality known as Sayuri, who killed the yakuza in revenge for her. Shortly after Sayuri’s first emergence, Yuri was abducted by a rival gang, who was arrested that same night. Since then, Yuri has lived with Kouzashi (Soichiro Hoshi/Grant George), a rookie policeman in his early to mid 20’s who was involved in saving her. That new life of hers came to an end as well, when Kouzashi was mortally wounded by the RSF in a raid mission. After an impromptu clash between the then-reemerged Sayuri and Shiho, Yuri decides to join the Kikyuuren so she can use the Kiguma, not to bring her parents or Kouzashi back to life, but to make Sayuri her own person in an attempt to befriend her. Also from Aizuwakamatsu is Isamu Watanabe (Daisuke Namikawa/Dave Wittenberg), a bakery employee who knows Yuri from daily interactions. His motivation for joining the Kikyuuren – a decision where Yuri did much of the convincing – is finding a woman with a heart-shaped beauty mark that he met on a train once and immediately clicked with, but has been unable to find since. Next is Ai Takahashi (Nana Mizuki/Bridget Hoffman), a former ballerina who broke her leg during an important performance, much like the protagonist of Rideback; but instead of having adventures piloting a motorcycle mecha, she instead settles for teaching young kids ballet in Koriyama. Shiho and Aki convince her to join the Kikyuuren, in which she decides to use the Kiguma to bring her leg back to its original state so she can return to the stage. After that is Nana Koizumi (Romi Park/Mary Elizabeth McGlynn), the owner and operator of a small clinic in the seaside town of Kitaibaraki. She went into the medical profession with high hopes, but despite receiving her doctorate, she lost her faith in humanity after learning her father, who she idolized, was a notorious adulterer. As stand-offish as she is, she joins the Kikyuuren through the usual methods. Her motivations are lost on me, but I think it was a mix of her dad getting his comeuppance and her regaining the zest for life she previously lost. The final member of the Kikyuuren is Kane Saitou (Yoshihisa Kawahara/Travis Willingham), the co-founder and former second-in-command of Ryudis who left the government after disagreements with Kataoka on how it should be run. Targeted for desertion and hunted after by the generic Ryudis forces, Kane runs into the Kikyuuren in Kitaibaraki’s industrial district, joining up with them after the RSF gets involved, with no intention to use the Kiguma but to instead give Kataoka a piece of his mind. Besides Kataoka, the Ryudis government characters with supporting roles only number two: Yevgeny Ostrovsky (Jouji Nakata/Jamieson Price), a former KGB agent who currently serves as Kataoka’s adviser, and Natsuko Yamamoto (Rie Kugimiya/Cristina Vee), Ryudis’s top hacker and another liaison with the RSF. Yevgeny only appears in episode 12 and even then doesn’t do much, though plans were made for him in the second half, and Natsuko fulfilled her role as an annoying know-it-all super-hacker type, so yeah, neither one was that well-received. On the flipside, perhaps the best-received characters of the bunch were the members of the RSF, Ryudis’s top army soldiers who do missions in modified versions of special mecha used by the army, known as Shiroteros. The RSF consists of Daisuke Takahashi (Junichi Suwabe/Crispin Freeman in rare double duty), team leader and bisexual ladies’ man who, despite having the levelest head of the bunch, has quite the inferiority complex when it comes to targets he fails to suppress, in this case Shiho; Kichirou Shuuta (no seiyuu or VA), a chain smoker who doesn’t say a word due to a birth defect in his lungs and instead communicates with a crude sign language, yet somehow manages to be the resident snarker of the group; and Iva Izumi (Ami Koshimizu/Lauren Landa), the token female of the group, an attractive bombshell with a hair trigger and a desire to wreck shit, drawing the dissatisfaction of both Daisuke and Kichirou. Their interactions and banter are simply the best, surpassing even OH DADDY’s interactions, and as such they were well-received by those who bothered to give feedback on Kiguma. THE PLOT PROGRESSION Spoiler As with regular anime, it’s important for the hypothetical equivalent to have a clear progression between chapters and appropriate breathers if need be, if not outright filler to pad for time if the story is too spread-out. As with all works I’ve decided to bring to life as hypothetical anime, I’ve planned out the entirety of Kiguma from start to finish. I can’t remember most of the episode titles, but they’re all named after the fake Takkyu Ishino tracks I made up for the OST. Episode 1, as one might expect, is the intro. Exposition on the Destroy Event and Kiguma, OH DADDY and Aki meeting up with Toshio, the RSF attacking the first time, and Shiho emerging at the end. Episode 2 follows up with the first action sequence between Shiho and the RSF, while the rest is all about the Kikyuuren, then without a name, having to get used to Shiho’s presence; especially Hekireki, who immediately dislikes Shiho, especially after an attempt at peeking on her changing, because anime and perverts. Episodes 3 and 4 are the Yuri/Sayuri introduction episodes. The former is about half Yuri/Sayuri intro, half Kikyuuren arriving in Aizuwakamatsu, with something in there about the RSF targeting Yuri and/or Kouzashi for vaguely stupid reasons. Episode 4 starts off with another action sequence, this time Sayuri fending off the RSF before Shiho engages with the both of them, and the second half is Shiho and Hekireki listening to Yuri share her tragic backstory while the Kikyuuren guys are stuck on the roof with Kouzashi's body. (Covered with a tarp, but still…) Episode 5 has Yuri tie up some loose ends in her regular life to make her departure seem more natural, and introduces Isamu. Episode 6 has Isamu brought into the Kikyuuren, the Kikyuuren’s name being decided upon, and the RSF being told of an important mission that, despite me avoiding outright saying anything, obviously has something to do with Shiho. Episode 7 is Ai’s intro and recruitment, packaged with an awkward fanservice scene involving Shiho wearing a hadaka apron to woo Hekireki, and ends with a post-credits sequence where the RSF learns they’re going after Shiho long-term. Cue episode 8, the first “all-action” episode. Though the first several minutes are the RSF learning about Shiho’s danger potential and her ties to the Saitama Massacre, it’s mostly Shiho taking on all three Shiroteros at once, going on a run for her money for a while but ultimately coming out on top against Daisuke, who decides to commit himself to defeating her next time at the end. Episodes 9 through 12 all take place in Kitaibaraki. #9 starts with Yuri passing out from heatstroke and going to Nana’s clinic to recover, after which the doc’s issues are revealed and she’s recruited into the Kikyuuren. The RSF subplot involves an experimental new Shirotero designed for detaining individuals, which leads into episode 10, a beach episode that’s interrupted by Iva using the experimental Shirotero to capture all the girls. This proves important, as Hekireki being among the captured prompts Shiho to force herself into control of Toshio’s body – the first time that’s ever happened – rescue Hekireki, and defeat Iva’s mech while she’s at it. Hekireki doesn’t thank Shiho for saving her, nor does she act tsun-tsun about it; she just runs away, unsure how to react for someone she has every reason to dislike legitimately saving her life with no ill-minded intent. And here’s where we get to episode 11, and the only one with a title I can remember off the top of my head, “unwilling mistress”. This episode, lacking the OP and ED and running half a minute longer than normal, centers around Hekireki trying to contend with Shiho having saved her for legitimate reasons and struggling to thank her for it, with Shiho expressing surprisingly wholesome feelings for her – a contrast to the usual – pushing her even deeper into her inability to just say it. Johnny and Kujo explain the situation to Shiho, and the three decide to urge Hekireki to come out of hiding and thank Shiho properly together, which they do by performing a somber cover version of the Asian Kung-Fu Generation song “Understand”, which I remember doing a decent alternate English language translation for, for her. (I also remember Kujo claiming “Re:Re:” wasn’t a tie-up, four years before the ERASED anime made it one.) Hekireki finally thanks Shiho after that, and their relationship starts to improve from there. Cap it off with a post-credits sequence teasing Kane on the run, and you have my favorite episode of Kiguma that I actually wrote up. The last episode I wrote, #12, is the one where the actual plot starts to take some turns. Kane is on the run from Ryudis army grunts, and Shiho steps in to take care of them, at one point refusing to let Toshio take back control because it would mean him getting killed. Kane joins up with them in thanks, only for the RSF and additional army grunts to confront them, leading the Kikyuuren to question who Kane even is. Meanwhile, Kataoka’s having his meeting with his cabinet, only to be criticized for his lack of results, which he decides to prove otherwise on with the confrontation taking place. The episode ends with a missile heading for the Kikyuuren, then a cliffhanger. That was the last any potential readers could see of Kiguma. Real-world school stuff and the general ennui that I experience after writing a cour’s worth of hypothetical anime episodes set in, and the rest of Kiguma never saw the light of day. However, the story was just getting started… THE PLANNED SECOND HALF Spoiler I had written a little over half of Kiguma’s 13th episode by the time I put it on indefinite hiatus, and as one might expect, it picked up where the last episode left off. Shiho engaged the RSF in battle, with Sayuri providing back-up, the main spectacle being a battle between Shiho and Kichirou’s upgraded Shirotero set to the tune of “Flicker” by SUPERCAR. Kane’s identity as Ryudis’s former second-in-command is revealed, and he officially joins the Kikyuuren after the battle dies down and the survivors retreat. Kataoka’s plot is wrapped up as well, likely with disapproval by his cabinet. I’d gotten a good portion of the action done, but never got to Shiho vs. Kichirou because writing good action consistently is hard, it turns out. Regarding episodes I planned but never wrote, here’s the general gist for all of them. Episode 14 would have been an OH DADDY origin episode, detailing how Johnny came to form his band, how he met up with Hekireki and Kujo, their failure to draw crowds due to his stage fright, and the one time they put on a decent show for a mostly-empty club Dropkix-style, all told to Shiho by the band themselves. Episodes 15 and 16 would have two plots happening in alternation. The first half of 15 and the second of 16 would be another Shiho/Hekireki relationship advancement plot; Shiho buys a custom dominatrix outfit at a mall shop to give Hekireki as a gift, Heki refuses it out of disgust, but later that night at the Kikyuuren’s next squatting grounds, she tries it on and gets some enjoyment out of it, followed by some drama as she realizes that she actually has feelings for Shiho beyond the usual vitriol and, after some reassurance from Johnny, officially becomes a couple with her. (I was doing nonsensical lesbian relationships before Western cartoons made it cool!) The second half of 15 and first of 16, meanwhile, had Kane tell the Kikyuuren about how he met Kataoka, a government official ousted for his radical beliefs, during the anarchy following the Japanese government’s deposition, their founding of Ryudis and takeback of the country, and the falling out that led to Kane going rogue. Filling in the blanks where needed and all that. Episode 17 was part traveling, with focus on Shiho and Hekireki’s evolved relationship being a disturbing change of pace for the rest of the Kikyuuren, and part action, with the RSF trying another solo go at eliminating Shiho. Episode 18 is part action, with Shiho defeating the RSF yet again, and part Shiho/Hekireki relationship advancement, with them going on a date in a nearby town while the rest of the Kikyuuren are holed up in the night’s squatting grounds. Episode 19 is mostly traveling for the Kikyuuren, while Ryudis and the RSF get the most focus, notably with Daisuke interacting with and bonding with Yevgeny over little things that they have in common. It ends with the OH DADDY members, finally sick and tired of Toshio keeping secrets, confronting him about what the deal is with him and Shiho. It's at this point we get into spoiler territory – kinda silly, me giving spoiler warnings for something I’m never going to write – so feel free to skip past this and to “The Loss” if you so wish. If not, then buckle up ‘cause it’s gonna get wild. Episode 20 is all Toshio’s backstory, told by him to Johnny, Hekireki and Kujo. Basically, he was your average introvert who, by the power of shit luck, wound up bullied/abused by everyone he met, from classmates to teachers and even his own parents. One night at his home in Saitama, a few hours after the Destroy Event took place, a beam of light came down from the sky and struck him; as a result, Shiho appeared for the first time, using her sniper rifle to kill his parents. Every time Toshio freaked out whenever tormented, Shiho appeared and eliminated the bullies for him. Naturally, this led to people believing Toshio was the one behind it, resulting in a mob forming to basically lynch the poor kid. Naturally, Shiho came out again, and that’s how the Saitama Massacre happened. Around 10,000 dead total. Toshio obviously reeled from the shock of such a thing, but Shiho in particular felt extremely guilty about it, shutting herself away inside Toshio for several months. Toshio started living like a nomad after that, hiding out for days to weeks at a time before public presence in those areas led him to move. He was living in Niigata for a while when he heard about the rumors surrounding the Kiguma, at which point he decided to form the Kikyuuren so he could reach it, for reasons that remain a mystery. Shocked by the whole story, Johnny, Hekireki and Kujo decide to keep quiet about everything, for the sake of the rest of the Kikyuuren. Next, episode 21. After a brief scene where Shiho, who comes out for the first time out of her own volition, and then asks and receives forgiveness for her actions from Hekireki, the Kikyuuren set out and finally make it to Tokyo… where Iva, in charge of an expanded RSF minus Daisuke and Kichirou, who are observing from afar, are waiting for them. Shiho engages the army in a huge action sequence, ending with a one-on-one with Iva that results in the latter’s Shirotero being completely destroyed. Nothing too out of the ordinary so far… until Yevgeny, dressed for battle himself, comes out and puts a bullet in Iva’s head for ultimately failing in stopping Shiho, even at full power. Daisuke and Kichirou are devastated by Iva’s death, the latter of whom lets out a guttural scream in his only line of spoken "dialogue", while Shiho finds out she has one more obstacle to get through before reaching the Ryudis Governmental Building in the form of Yevgeny. Episode 22. First act is Shiho vs. Yevgeny, ending with the former mortally wounding the latter, but the latter deciding he’s lived long enough and allowing himself to bleed out. After that, the Kikyuuren finally meet face-to-face with Kataoka, who decides to end Shiho himself to save his reputation, prompting Kane to pull a gun on him as well, but before anyone can make a move, the two government scientists who discovered the Kiguma, and leaked the rumors about its abilities themselves, show up and convince Kataoka to stand down, allowing the Kikyuuren the chance to finally use the Kiguma after so long. As it turns out, the Kiguma is a quantum supercomputer program they developed through trial and error, with the Destroy Event serving as the signal for its creation. Before they can do any wishing, the Kiguma program surveys all the Kikyuuren members to determine the intent of their desires. However, it detects an anomaly – Sayuri’s wish to remove Yuri’s personality and take over her body completely – and, being unable to grant wishes involving murder or even identity death, decides to shut down. Unfortunately, being “quantum”, the Kiguma shutting down amounts to the entire universe experiencing a Big Crunch effect that would essentially reset everything, with the computer housing the Kiguma itself being the center in which everything will converge. Episode 23. The Kikyuuren, Kataoka, Daisuke, Kichirou, and the Kiguma scientists are all trapped in the room where the Kiguma is located, coming to terms with the world literally ending and trying to make peace with that fact in the thirty minutes before the reset takes place. But what’s most prominent here, above all else, is Shiho deciding to tell everyone her story, and Hekireki specifically the reason behind her submissive attraction to her. Five years ago, Shiho was a third-year at a high school in Tokyo, with a couple friends but never really sociable. At her school’s fall festival, she fell in love with the drummer of the light music club, who performed onstage in the gym that day; she was already fairly popular with other students, some of her female admirers even acting like servants to her, but Shiho was so nervous about actually interacting with her that she held back. When she found out that her crush was going to college outside of Tokyo, she poured her feelings into a letter that she planned on giving her before she left. She never got the chance, as in her rush to reach her in time, she was hit by a car and killed, becoming a ghost as a result of her unfinished business. Shiho then spent the next few years wandering Tokyo as a spirit in a depressed haze, with the items she had on her when she passed – a collar, her sniper rifle, and the love letter – in her possession. She was sitting on top of the Ryudis Governmental Building, watching over Tokyo, when the Destroy Event happened, trapping her in the beam of light and sending her to the far reaches of the universe, only to reach the edge and be bounced back towards Earth. The reflected beam of light that was the Destroy Event – the Kiguma in a condensed form – sent Shiho towards Saitama, where she found herself absorbed into the body of Toshio, her distant cousin, in the aftermath. Knowing of Toshio’s poor situation from her own parents, and possessing the means to protect him, Shiho’s elimination of Toshio’s tormentors came about out of a desire to protect him from the harm she wished she could have kept him out of were she still alive. But that’s not all. After sharing her story, Shiho gives Hekireki the love letter she wrote – and kept, after all this time – for her to read, since there’s no way she can give it to her crush now; since Hekireki reminds her of the tomboyish yet undoubtedly feminine drummer she fell in love with, hence the intense attraction, it’s as good as anything. It’s only in reading the letter that Hekireki realizes she’s the drummer Shiho had a crush on, and lets her know that with a heartfelt response. Satisfied that the desire that kept her bound to the Earth was finally granted, Shiho is ready to face the end with Hekireki as the Kiguma’s reset counter reaches its final minute… …but out of nowhere, Toshio, refusing to let the world end before his wish, still a mystery, is granted, forcibly separates himself from Shiho, places his hands on the Kiguma supercomputer, and absorbs all of its energy into himself, reversing the Big Crunch effect and becoming the embodiment of the Kiguma itself as a result. Episode 24, the final episode. Toshio, now with the powers of the Kiguma at his fingertips, proceeds to grant the Kikyuuren’s wishes as requested. Johnny, Yuri and Ai get their wishes granted immediately, while Aki, Isamu and Nana are informed that theirs will see themselves come true in due time. He grants wishes for Kujo and Kane they didn’t know they had, Hekireki’s wish that she toyed with giving the Kiguma to feel included, Sayuri’s subconscious desire to be rid of her murderous traits, and Shiho’s new wish to stay by Hekireki’s side forever. Finally, Toshio grants his own wish: to delete himself from existence so he no longer has to be a burden to anyone, with the witnesses to his actions being the only ones to remember that he was ever there. As Toshio perishes, the Kiguma supercomputer breaks apart, and so does the room housing it, freeing everyone from its confines. The sun starts to set, and everyone looks forward to what the future may hold, now that their goals have finally been reached. And the epilogue. One year passes after the Kikyuuren’s interaction with the Kiguma and Toshio’s deletion, dubbed the Second Destroy Event. The Kikyuuren has split up, and everyone has moved on with their lives. Aki still works at his dad’s sporting goods store, but has a girlfriend now, which was enough to improve his life on his terms. Isamu reunited with the girl with the heart-shaped mole, who’s now helping him out at the bakery. Yuri and Sayuri are now living with Isamu and his girlfriend as members of their household. Ai is back onstage doing ballet. Nana is still working at her clinic, but with a positive attitude thanks to karma finally getting back at her father. Kane is part of Ryudis again, serving as Kataoka’s new adviser and helping him run Ryudis in a more proactive, less violent manner than before. My personal favorite epilogue idea that I have to share involves Daisuke; as he and Kichirou are paying their respects to Iva at the cemetery for Ryudis employees, he spots his mother at Yevgeny’s grave, and learns that Yevgeny was actually his step-dad from childhood. Daisuke’s mom even points out the irony in Yevgeny interacting with her son despite telling him never to speak to her or her children ever again. As for OH DADDY, while they aren’t “big time” yet, they’re starting to draw crowds at the local clubs in Niigata, thanks to Johnny no longer feeling afraid while onstage. What’s more, Shiho has joined the band as their vocalist – fulfilling Kujo’s wish to finally fill the band’s missing slot – and has taken up Hekireki’s stage name of “Consuela”, leaving her with the more appropriate name of “Angel”. And yes, they’re still together. The series ends with OH DADDY performing a song Shiho wrote, as a way of keeping Toshio’s spirit alive in a positive way despite everyone but them and the rest of the Kikyuuren forgetting who he was. All those ideas, just waiting to be put to digital paper. Some of them may be cringey and ridiculous, even for a hypothetical anime, and some bits I even recently added as I was recounting the general outline. I’d love to write them all down and finally bring closure to Kiguma after seven to eight years of leaving it sit incomplete. However, I can’t. Not because of some personal injury or anything, but because of the whole reason for this essay’s being. Kiguma is lost media. And I just can’t complete something that I, the creator of Kiguma, no longer have complete access to. THE LOSS Spoiler Everyone remembers the day the [adult swim] Message Boards finally shut down. November 2, 2016; the day after the presidential election that would break America. But for most of us, the ASMB truly ended in the January of that year, when the forum’s design was given a complete overhaul. Gone were the specified folders with years’ worth of threads both major and minor, and in came a mish-mash of uncategorized threads that were difficult to navigate and just as tough to read and search through. Plans were made by one of the mods, the late great J. Michael “SwimMod_Luuv” Crow, to compile the old boards into an accessible archive, but it never came to pass. Everything was lost, including the AD fiction boards, including Kiguma. Now, it’s entirely possible that Kiguma can still be found. The Wayback Machine is a thing that exists, and I’ve used it to access old ASMB threads in the past. For all I know, Kiguma – its first few chapters, at least – remains accessible through this wonderful asset for reading web pages lost to time. But considering how much I’ve cringed remembering what I could of what I’ve written of Kiguma, I imagine laying eyes upon its physical digital form – the chapters, the feedback, that one post best described as Dr. Legs shouting “EMPATHY!” in episodes 3 and 4 of Gemusetto: Death Beat(s) in text form – would send me into a coma of secondhand embarrassment. I’m better off pretending it’s lost than taking a chance in seeing if it really is. You can take that chance, but not me. Not me. Okay, maybe me. Two months after posting this, I went and looked, and all seven pages of the ASMB thread are available for viewing on the Wayback Machine. I've gotta say, I'm actually pretty thrilled about this. 😁 Still, though Kiguma is accessible through those means, my original files for the series – the specific episode documents, the staff and character profile compilations, the unfinished script for episode 13 – are lost forever. I know this because I witnessed this loss firsthand. Back in my high school/early college days, I kept all my personal word processor and spreadsheet documents that weren’t school-related on a 2-GB flash drive wristband I got as a free gift from one of the official quiz team tournaments I partook in during high school. Everything hypothetical anime-related was on that drive: NIBAI MUGENDAI, Kiguma, not Kinky Kunoichi because I didn’t know about Jam-Orbital until March 2016 (and “Attack of the Kinky Kunoichi” was posted a month later), and several other ideas that I hadn’t gotten off the ground yet. I used it frequently without fail, with the only issues cropping up being the occasional need to recover files that wound up corrupted because I didn’t remove the USB in a safe manner. No huge problem, outside of the one time the recovery of one work I was writing was replaced with a copy of another work I was writing, they were mostly non-issues. Until the big issue. On January 27, 2016, I plugged in my flash drive as usual, only to get a weird warning: it said that it was corrupted, and that the only way I could access the flash drive for use was to delete everything that was on it. Not wanting to lose all I’d worked so hard for in the spare time I made for myself, I downloaded the first USB file recovery client I could in the limited free time I had that day on campus, and proceeded to recover everything I could from the drive, and once I was sure it was safe, only then did I allow the USB to wipe itself clean. Lessons were learned that day; I bought a new flash drive to replace the old one – this one 16 gigs! – and I never removed a flash drive without clicking to safely remove it ever again. I also quit using OpenOffice cold turkey, becoming a pure Microsoft Office stan from that point on. OpenOffice was a nice free substitute for Microsoft Office, especially on my first laptop when I was blocked from using Microsoft Office after 25 uses without a laptop product key that somehow didn’t work, but it had gotten old by the time I was able to use Microsoft Office without restrictions on my swanky new HP Elitebook. And the great thing about Microsoft Office was that everything that was under its file type on that flash drive was successfully recovered, even the archaic WPS files from the original script-style run of NIBAI MUGENDAI, and the still-incomplete episode of Sumire’s Rubber Diary that I thought was lost media after that botched recovery! The OpenOffice files, in comparison, were much more limited in what was successfully recovered. Chapter 9 of the initial novelization-style run of NIBAI MUGENDAI that never got posted, a document of the Japanese-language staff for that same run, a spreadsheet of the English-language staff for the original run, and a couple others were okay, but everything else couldn’t be recovered. Most disappointingly, everything relating to Kiguma was lost. All because of a corrupted flash drive and a recovery client that didn’t do a good enough job with the non-Microsoft Office files. The only thing I had within my collection of various files relating to Kiguma, serving as proof of the story’s existence until my dive into the Wayback Machine, was this screenshot of some Kisekae characters I made to resemble Shiho and Hekireki. Kind of cruel, that the most cringeworthy part of Kiguma looking back was what survived the double-whammy onslaught that wrecked everything else… THE NEXT STEPS Spoiler Kiguma is, and in most cases was, many things. It was my second hypothetical anime I seriously thought about writing up and presenting to the world. It was the first hypothetical anime that I treated with realistic staff constraints in mind (minus the whole “I’m the director” thing). It was my attempt at doing an original with community input in the form of character submissions, getting in on a trend that was dying out. It was my effort at creating a hypothetical anime within the constraints placed on typical televised anime. It was a short-sighted endeavor at shipping one of my characters with the character of a user I had a misguided cyber-crush on and having it end happily instead of in cannibalism for the sake of shock value. It was proof that I easily burned out after writing twelve whole episodes of one thing, usually to the point of never coming back to it if the real world was bogging me down hard enough. It was the hypothetical anime that crawled so Kinky Kunoichi could walk. It was a lesson in hindsight on always making copies of your own creations so you never lose them to message board overhauls and USB drive corruptions that happen within two weeks of one another at most. And most importantly, it is my contribution to the ever-growing pile of lost media in the wide world of entertainment. Do I think there’s still potential in Kiguma, looking back at it over a decade after its inception? Yes, there is. With a little refining here and there, and maybe some truncation to help tighten up areas of slow pacing, I think it could work as a plausible anime idea, if not an excellent pitch that others could use to develop in their own direction. Hell, looking back on what I’ve planned for it, I’m tempted to go back and give Kiguma a new lease on life, a fresh retake applying all that I’ve learned in how to write a hypothetical anime I can be proud of and not just satisfactory in the moment with. But will I actually go through with writing it? No, I won’t. Not just because writing what I shared could’ve been would be awkward in an age where comical non-consent is even unfunnier and unsexier than it already was in 2010, but with neither the same audience I wrote it for over a decade ago having made the transfer over to the ASMB, nor the ability to recover the incomplete 13th’s script almost five years following the moment it memory holed itself out of existence, I don’t think I’d be doing the Kiguma that was justice with the Kiguma that’s still yet to be, or even the Kiguma that could be in a whole new decade. And to rewrite it without any of the characters that were part of it in its beginning stages? That wouldn’t be right! When it comes down to it, Kiguma is best left as a memory, a piece of media that might still be out there in some fashion, but whose existence as it is now is encapsulated entirely within the above essay. I may include Shiho in a later chapter of an on-and-off series I’m doing where the main character of NIBAI MUGENDAI is roommates with my super-friendly big-breasted hella masochist OC from this side of DeviantArt, but that’s as far as I’m willing to go in the current year and the one following regarding revisiting Kiguma. That’s the thing about being a lost media creator; sometimes revisiting your previous work is hard when there’s no work to revisit. Until that work is found again, at least. Like I confirmed it was on February 17, 2021. I hope you all enjoyed this recollection of ASMB's Action Discussion fanfic culture, my attempted contribution to it, and the ensuing aftermath, no matter how hard it may have been to get from point A to point B. [this has been a Poke service announcement] Edited February 17, 2021 by PokeNirvash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PokeNirvash Posted February 17, 2021 Author Share Posted February 17, 2021 (edited) UPDATE: For reasons relating to my side hobby adding staff to Anime News Network, I snuck into the old Wayback Machine archives of the ASMB to check out the thread I made for Kiguma. After finding out it was there, I decided to make a wave of edits to the above post to more or less reflect its current status. The links for viewing are listed below. Page 1 (eps 1-2)Page 2 (ep 3)Page 3 (ep 4)Page 4 (eps 5-6)Page 5 (eps 7-8)Page 6 (eps 9-10)Page 7 (eps 11-12) Another post coming later regarding the informational basics. Edited February 17, 2021 by PokeNirvash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PokeNirvash Posted February 17, 2021 Author Share Posted February 17, 2021 And now for the informational basics. EPISODE 1: KIGUMA Premiere Date: July 17, 2010 Script: Kareta Gohsawa (that's me) Storyboard & Episode Director: Kunihiro Mori (The Mars Daybreak, Shounen Onmyouji director) Animation Director: Toshihiro Kawamoto (Cowboy Bebop, Wolf's Rain character designer) Content Rating: TV-14L EPISODE 2: WHO'S THAT GIRL? Premiere Date: July 24, 2010 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Masayuki Miyaji (Xam'd: Lost Memories, Fuse: Memoirs of a Huntress director) Animation Director: Eiji Nakada (Code Geass mechanical designer, Sacred Seven character designer) Content Rating: TV-14DLV EPISODE 3: RYUDIS Premiere Date: August 14, 2010 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard: Akira Hashimoto (literally who) Episode Director: Yasuhiro Geshi (Lil' Red Riding Hood Cha-Cha, Aqua Age episode director) Animation Director: Masashi Koizuka (Attack on Titan seasons 2-3 director) Content Rating: TV-14DLV EPISODE 4: LETHALIZER Premiere Date: December 21, 2010 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Takayuki Tanaka (Aquarion, Noein: to your other self storyboarder & episode director) Animation Director: Ryo-timo (Birdy the Mighty: Decode character design, Yozakura Quartet: Hana no Uta director) Production Cooperation: A-1 Pictures (Sword Art Online, Blue Exorcist) Content Rating: TV-MA EPISODE 5: JOINTED DESIRE Premiere Date: March 30, 2011 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Yusaku Saotome (Delinquent in Drag, Going Wild director) Animation Director: Yuji Ushijima (Princess Tutu, Fairy Tail animation director) Production Cooperation: Yuhodo Content Rating: TV-14DL EPISODE 6: UNITED AS NONE Premiere Date: May 14, 2011 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Masaki Tachibana (Barakamon, Princess Principal director) Animation Director: Yukie Akiya (Code:Breaker, Princess Principal character designer) Content Rating: TV-14DL EPISODE 7: PRIMA BALLERINA SEARCHING FOR A STATUS QUO Premiere Date: July 13, 2011 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard, Episode Director, & Animation Director: Toshihiro Kikuchi (Yozakura Quartet 2008, VitaminX Addiction character designer) Production Cooperation: Nomad (Rozen Maiden, Kämpfer) Content Rating: TV-14DLS EPISODE 8: ANNIHILATION OF THE BLUE SNIPER Premiere Date: August 16, 2011 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Masayuki Miyaji Animation Directors: Yutaka Nakamura (Cowboy Bebop, RahXephon animator), Toshihiro Kawamoto Content Rating: TV-14LV EPISODE 9: BRAIN TRIP Premiere Date: November 26, 2011 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard & Episode Director: Yoshihide Yuuzumi (Yurumates 3Dei, Oneechan ga Kita director) Animation Director: Yuya Takahashi (Senki Zesshou Symphogear G, Lupin the 3rd: Part IV animation director) Production Cooperation: C2C (Harukana Receive, Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina) Content Rating: TV-14L EPISODE 10: VICTORY THROUGH INSANITY Premiere Date: March 28, 2012 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard: Tomoki Kyoda (Eureka seveN, RahXephon: Pluralitas Concentio director) Episode Director: Kazuya Murata (Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, Fullmetal Alchemist: The Sacred Star of Milos director) Animation Directors: Eiji Nakada, Yoshiyuki Ito (Fullmetal Alchemist, Space Dandy character designer) Content Rating: TV-14LSV EPISODE 11: UNWILLING MISTRESS Premiere Date: May 31, 2012 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard: Kareta Gohsawa, Masayuki Sakoi (Strawberry Panic!, NEEDLESS director) Episode Director: Masayuki Sakoi Animation Directors: Toshihiro Kikuchi, Masashi Koizuka Content Rating: TV-14DLS EPISODE 12: COMING STORM Premiere Date: August 9, 2012 Script: Kareta Gohsawa Storyboard: Kareta Gohsawa, Katsumi Terahigashi (Eureka seveN, Durarara!! storyboarder), Namimi Sanjo (a.k.a. Hitoshi Nanba; Heroman, Golden Kamuy director), Masayuki Miyaji Episode Director: Masayuji Miyaji Animation Directors: Koichi Horikawa (Wolf's Rain, My Hero Academia animation director), Satoshi Mori (another literally who) Content Rating: TV-MA EPISODE 13: THE BEAT IS LOOSE [DATA FOR THIS EPISODE AND BEYOND NOT FOUND] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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