The menace of adorable little girls™ and #justpostapocalypticthings: Black Bullet Episode 1 Review

Against the fervent wishes of my friend, I began Black Bullet, a spring 2014 Kinema Citrus production. Having seen Barakamon – oh who am I kidding, that has nothing to do with watching this. Why would one watch Black Bullet? Well, maybe one saw a poster of it while in Japan, gosh. And maybe skimmed (briefly) volume one of the LN series at a Barnes and Nobles. And, at the very least, the kids like this show.

Flames, yes flames – that’s pretty dang apocalyptic, right?  A boy’s dilated pupils come into view, revealing that he has not slept in ages. The frame expands, allowing for full view of a bonfire, warming people camping out. As if that wasn’t enough, a gigantic serpent-thing (“Gastrea”) appears and kills a swath of the campers. Soldiers fight off the Gastrea, causing it to fall to the ground, feet from the boy. Black Bullet would really like the viewer to take the hint that this society is on the verge of collapse from horrific monsters and technobabble.

When you think you have a handle on the show, the opening sequence places (featuring the piece “Black Bullet” by fripSide good song but subpar to “Only My Railgun”) an array of adorable little girls™ before the viewer, while submerging them in brilliant blue. At some point, it becomes all bright lights, which isn’t exactly nervewracking. Taking the arithmetic mean, one can see that this show combines adorable little girls™ with dangerous apocalyptic stuff™. How is someone expected to remember this plot? It makes no sense!

Ten years later, we learn that Rentarou – that boy – is a civil servant of some kind, which in this society actually means incognito gun-toting NRA supporter. No matter how sophisticated this society is, he rides on a bicycle to work. It’s important to be eco-friendly, especially if monsters are going to obliterate everything, because who will clean up the disasters then?? Rentarou was actually summoned to a horrific crime scene involving a, yes you guessed it, Gastrea. 

Fortunately, this show highly respects our intelligence, so we are introduced to a red-decorated intruder who wears a top hat but no monocle.  And even better, he’s against the Gastrea but also the government, not artificially deepening the conflict at all. I’m sure his white mask totally makes us want to root for him. At least, Top Hat Man™ decides to depart dramatically by jumping from the window.
 

What? You think I’ve mainly just been writing about a nonsensical plot?  This little girl, named Enju, laughs in your general direction while spousing off more technobabble. This entire episode focuses on its beloved jargon, with terms like Intiator, Gastrea, and Cursed Child.

Fortunately, animated shows have more than one category to them. Bizarrely enough, a show like this has a decent sense of humor – Rentarou does ridiculous things like buy bean sprouts to cook them for Enju. Best of all is Rentarou being scolded by Kisara the president for his reckless behavior, which includes, yes, buying bean sprouts on sale. Let me be more explicit – if this show focused on Rentarou, Enju, and Kisara in some bizarre slice-of-life, it would be alright if not just for the facial expressions alone.  Yuki Kaji, Rina Hidaka, and Yui Horie are all pretty great, so at least we can count on their voices in this series. …It’s gonna be a long viewing… It’s quite the feat to be 75% terrible and 25% decent but this show pulls it off splendidly.

As shoddy as the plot is, the episode, in its closing, drops an interesting remark about all Initiators (basically those who “initiate” the fight against Gastrea) having this Gastrea virus inside them. It’s definitely a Resident Evil ripoff, but at least the red eyes will keep us guessing, right? If Black Bullet would teach me about Gastrea virology, I’d probably be down. But if it wants to keep attempting to teach politics, then count me out. (I’ll probably still watch out of my own sheer stupidity.)

Don’t watch this…says the guy watching it. But if you do, do it for adorable little girls™.

Score: 28/100