Monday 19 August 2024

Jormungand: Perfect Order Review

Overall Rating 5.6 out of 10 - Sequel that makes bad worse as it attempts to give overreaching narrative to the show.

It's OK if you have nothing better to watch.

Why best girl Chinatsu did not get her own flashback. Yes, I know she was killed by the Koko's crew at the end of episode 4, but Jonah and Kaspar got half episode recap, why can't Chinatsu.

I do often complain that sequels are worse than originals and this one is unfortunately no exception. Original had a fair share of Black Lagoon style shootouts to make it worthwhile. This one has less of that. Instead, it focuses on things I did not like in the original Koko herself and her crew. Watching how Koko and her clique of crazy women wrap the world around their finger is not enjoyable at all. Best characters from the original do not return and new ones introduced in sequel are unlikable.

Unlike the original that was a series of 2 or more episodes arks, centered around one or another villain this one makes Koko's crew and her 'secret' plan the centerpiece of the story. That was an attempt at more serious storytelling. Unfortunately, it failed because her plan was trivial: end all wars by destroying all aircraft with some satellites somehow. Seriously. (Some might argue that Lelouch wanted the same, but he did not. Code Geass is much more nuanced show.)

I wrote many times why idea of stopping killing by banning weapons are stupid, but I guess I will use this opportunity to do it again. After all we humanity evolved from beasts when we learned to use rocks, sticks and pits to kill. 

We are not the only animals who kill their own either. Great Apes such as Chimpanzees do that too. Reasons for the killing are always the same, competition for the finite resources. War is simply extrapolation of this basic principle to a larger scale where instead of two individuals, two groups or two tribes it is two multimillion armies that fight it out. 

However, no matter if it's between two individuals or two armies, conflict remains. It cannot be eliminated even if one big empire would unite society under itself, eventually internal conflicts between top generals and armies loyal to each would tear such empire apart. See my articles on collapse of Roman empire as example of that. 

If anything, sophisticated weapons make conflict less likely or accessible as they divide people into those who have access to better weapons and those who do not.

The only way to eliminate conflict is either create infinite resources so that everyone has everything they want or reduce number of people to the level of resources available and keep it at that number.

However back to the show. In addition to what I said before it also has worse intro song. 

Overall, compare to its predecessor it, drifted into borderlands of the drop zone. A few more unlikable scenes or characters and I would have dropped it.

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