Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 03
You know you’re in trouble if when you wake up your alarm clock has been replaced by a military helicopter flying overhead, and the world is still going to hell. While Mirai’s line “This isn’t a dream, right?” is terribly clichéd, I guess it is pretty jarring to wake up to the aftermath of a magnitude 8.0 earthquake.
The show somewhat fulfils its premise here too. Did you know that convenience stores may give out food at times of crisis? Did you know that aftershocks can be as large as magnitude 5.0 and continue for three days? Well, now you do. Given that this could happen for real soon, I suspect people will be lapping up this info, especially when it’s presented in the form of an anime.
Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 02
We left Mirai and Yuuki at a bit of a precarious point last time, and this episode picks up exactly where we left off – Mirai wishing for the world to just break, and the world breaking quite spectacularly.
I noticed this episode that Bones display the horror of an earthquake of this magnitude incredibly well. Remember the loudly dressed woman whose son gave Mirai an ice-cream ass? Remember they were having a photo taken beside the mini Statue of Liberty? Well…
Thank God they don’t spell it out explicitly, for it would have ruined the realisation that a whole family who were made to be the villains last week have (presumably) been wiped out. It’s quite stark, and it’s no wonder that Mirai’s attitude has changed from last time after her foreboding e-mail and events like this.
Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 01
Summer 2009 looks like it’s going to be a pretty good season for new anime, not least because of the premises that some of them are putting forward. Like this show, Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 – the story of a huge earthquake hitting Tokyo. It seems simple enough on the face of it, but delve down in to specific characters and there’s great potential there.
The opening, while unlike its peers with flashy and expensive animation, is simple and conveys a real sense of disaster, what with its black and white stills of destroyed landmarks and vegetation growing in their wake, with our future protagonists steadily marching through the whole thing. It won’t win any “Best Opening” awards, though.
The message at the beginning of the show, warning people that this is fictional, based on research, and may be different to the real thing, really focuses the mind – remember that Tokyo is well overdue a massive earthquake and there are regular classes as to what one should do in the event of one. Take in to account that this is being broadcast on Fuji TV’s noitaminA block, which is scheduled between their normal programming and their late night anime as a gateway of sorts. You can tell that they’re trying to appeal to a wide and fearful demographic with this one.
It looks like this has worked – in the anime ratings for the Kanto region (source) for the 6th July – 12th July, the show managed to break in to the top 10 (usually a preserve for daytime shows) at number 9 with an average of 5.8% of households watching – the highest rated “late night” anime.
