Majin Bone Episode 7
What They Say:
Now, in the modern age, the creator of the universe, Majin, has revived suddenly. At the same time, visitors from the darkness have descended to Earth. As danger nears the Earth, three men pursue a young boy. “Is he a match? Could he really be humanity’s last hope?”
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Majin Bone has been losing me slowly but surely after the first couple of episodes where it didn’t seem like it really had a strong path or narrative to follow here. With essentially faceless villains that we don’t get much true personality out of and a kind of vague end of the world concept thrown at it, what kept me interested was the quality of the non-CG animation and the relaxed pacing that avoided being the usual way these kinds of shows go. But with the addition of the snarky and superior Gilbert and the forced bonding of the group through hardship, that just had me rolling my eyes more often than not since it didn’t bring anything decent to the table to really make anyone truly more likable.
The structure of the show certainly keeps things a bit off in some ways since we either start or end an episode with a fight that carries into the next and that just makes it feel kind of off. That dominates a good part of the first half here, but once again there’s no real investment in the fight and even less with the people involved since they’re all in transformed modes and their personalities are subsumed even more. That they deal with things well enough is expected, but the post-fight discussion takes an interesting turn as Luke suggests that they all head down to Australia where he has a relative that has a place where they can recover and figure out their bigger plan. Of course, it’s a men’s only retreat in a way so a certain young woman is kept from going, much to her dismay.
With it being winter in Australia, it’s not quite the easy and fun trip that some of them thought it would be, but they’re not exactly there to have fun but rather to do some exploration of who they are and their abilities, especially for Shogo. The institute that they end up in is pretty familiar with what’s going on and there’s some amusement that this odd assortment of characters is what’s standing between certain doom for the world. There’s not a lot of detail truly given here as it has a very superficial feeling, but we get a few more touches about the Majin but also the fact that these researchers claim to know very little. What we do get at the very end is the “revelation” that the enemy is extraterrestrial. Which is, like, a complete shocker apparently? It seemed like a given from the start, but hey, that’s Shogo for you.
In Summary:
So, now we know. Aliens. That’s the bulk of the takeaway from here when you get past the first half fight sequence, the silliness of going to Australia and some of the very superficial looks at the place that Luke has taken them to. Questions are truly few and far between and the most obvious things are treated as reality shattering moments by Shogo. Comically silly in the end. But at least it looks decent?
Grade: D
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Apple TV via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.