Kurokami: The Animation 01 – Why it’s called “The Animation”

Summaries? Screw that, someone else can do it.

Well, after watching it subbed and in glorious HD (dohoho I love being QC), I’ve at least figured out why they called it Kurokami: The Animation instead of just
Kurokami. Of course, this does raise the question of whether or not to call it Kurokami: The Animation or Black God: The Animation. Actually I think IATV is going with Kurokami so I guess no one cares about the manga translation.

In any case, the reason why they stuck in “The Animation” is because the anime is going to be vastly different from the manga. It’s best to imagine it as an alternate universe and throw out everything you know from the manga. If you look at it that way, it might actually be enjoyable (Linebarrels is exempted from this because it sucks dick in anime form) since they are diverging from the manga from the get go, rather than following it tightly and then riding anime-only content into the shitter. You know, like Claymore or a whole variety of other shows that are based off ongoing manga. Spoilers below.

Keita is a completely different character in the anime. For one, he’s a high school kid instead of an aspiring game programmer. He’s constantly depressed and makes excuses to avoid human contact due to his mom’s death. Contrast this with the original version where he’s actually pretty normal and also a huge asshole to Kuro. Emo or asshole, the choice is so difficult!

Kuro and Akane seem somewhat the same so far. Kuro being awesome because she’s voiced by Noriko Shitaya aka Sakura from FSN, so when she’s angry she sounds like Dark Sakura and that is automatically awesome. Oh, and she still doesn’t wear pants.

The show seems to have latched onto the concept of the doppeliners having different levels of luck and ran with it. Keita’s high school friend Rise is apparently “really lucky” but that doesn’t make her a Root. Mayu gets predictably hit by a truck but Excel (Yukari Tamura woop) nor Steiner (GEORGE NAKATA FUCK YAAAAA) are in the immediate area. I’m not sure where they’re going with the constant talk about luck and misfortune but it’s a lot more important as a plot element in the anime. They seem to really make Keita’s life as miserable as they can, though. His mom, his childhood friend, his only high school friend and the imouto-next-door all die in horrible doppeliner-related incidents. It was never this bad in the manga!

This reminds me, there’s a lack of certain people in the OP that would indicate there’s a significant change in plot. That chick who drives the Ferrari around who I like to refer to as Margery Daw.2 is notably absent along with her old man contractor. Hiyou and Shinobu are also absent and a doppeliner of Keita’s mom showed up on the subway, meaning the whole Okinawa arc is probably absent. This cuts out… well, pretty much the entire manga. Reishin is in the OP, though, so I guess Kuro will just beat him up at episode 12 (or whatever the last one is) and we’ll be done with the show.

They also included some generic looking guy with glasses who appears to be the one trying forcing Doppeliners to meet each other in order to produce Master Roots. Which is weird because I’m pretty sure that’s what Akane’s doppeliner was doing. In any case, he turns out to be the doppeliner of one of Keita’s childhood friends (or maybe he is his friend, who knows!) so that’s another anime only thing for you.

I personally thought the manga’s plot was fine the way it is, but it looks like they couldn’t compress it to fit the schedule to fit the 1 cour schedule. That being said, the budget is pretty sweet considering the fight scenes and the excessively detailed backgrounds which are everywhere. I thought it was going to be a lot worse considering there are, what, three Sunrise shows going on right now? I figured this one would be the low budget production of the season.

I still hope for the show to do well and I imagine it would introduce a lot more people to the manga. It’d be nice for Noriko Shitaya to get more big roles, too! Besides, it’s got GEORGE NAKATA.

Oh, and calling that the initial part of Ep 1 is just him going O HEY WHAR MY ARM GO, GUYS?

EDIT: It has been pointed out to me that both Hiyou and Shinobu are in the OP. My point still stands that they’re not going to Okinawa.