That is what I am waiting in this show!
As promised in my Twitter and on the official O: R Fanpage, will do a review of the first episode of the classic anime, Neo-Human Casshern (Shinzou Ningen Kyashan) and along the way, I might compare it with the Sins remake!
The plot of the episode is a standard introduction episode. They setup the elements that we will see in the next episodes, namely: robots want to takeover the world and leading them is Braiking Boss and Casshern with his dog, Friender are up to stop them. Second is that Casshern’s father, Dr. Azuma is a threat to Braiking Boss’ plans adding him to the checklist of characters that has great importance in the series, same goes with Swanny. Sure, she looked liked some innocent robot swan but why is it she is seen most of the time in the opening credits?
As for the setting, the government has no major involvement in this one, making them sitting ducks as the Android Squad here is taking control of the world. Because of this, it is established and confirmed by Dr. Azuma that humans are scarred of robots and once they will discover that Casshern here is part-man, part-machine, they might reject Casshern, thinking that he might betray them in some point. And so, I noticed Ishinomori’s influence in this show. If you watched Kamen Rider or any of Ishinomori-sensei’s other cyborg heroes, you will get what I am talking about.
Let’s talk about the individual origin stories. First, let’s talk about Android BK-1 aka Braiking Boss. His origin story reminded me of the classic novel, Frankenstein except unlike the monster that was born out of lighting, we have an android who is working with the humans for quite sometime and was just hit by lightning thanks to the metallic object found on top of the castle.
Unlike the Franky’s monster, BK here is smart enough to oppose his master, unlike Franky’s monster in which it took a couple of chapters for the monster to have its own personality and amount of dialog (yes, Frankenstein’s monster is talking to add it up, he reads and you thought he is some dumb monster!).
What adds up with his smartness is that he abused the remains of the old Azuma castle and claim it as his base of operations in which he created mass-produced robots for his invasion of mankind! And unlike his Sins counterpart, Braiking Boss is the one who likes his hands dirtied much for his goals of dominating the humans. He is the type of leader that treats his own kind well as seen with his interaction with Swanny.
Friender is one heck of a dog! Before he became known as Friender, he is just a regular dog named Lucky who tackled BK-1, and BK-1 shoved him out which ended up the dog breaking the window and fall from a castle tower… and lived. Rescued Luna (who isn’t a loli, BTW) from a robot, which ended his luck. However, he was revived as Friender!
As Friender, he breaths fire and turn into a jet… which is awesome! Aside from that, Lucky’s fighting skills is still intact in Friender except that his bites and scratches are stronger compared to a regular dog. And if you are asking me who is my favorite character in this episode, definitely Friender!
As for Tetsuya, he is the classic hero. He is the type of person who is willing to sacrifice his own humanity for the sake of mankind, hence his old human body was disintegrated and ends up with an android body created by his father, giving birth to Casshern!And unlike his Sins counterpart, he is heroic and not a man who carries the sin he never remembers. In short, he is not an emotional berserker or what most people would like to call it, emo.
For the fights, even in the short amount of time, we are able to see a lot of epic robot gore and how Casshern fights. He fights like an acrobat and has two guns that acts as boosters once he presses the trigger of the guns. Considering the limitations back in the day, the fights are gorgeous and so it the robot gore seen in the fights.
Overall, the first episode of Casshern gave us what we will expect more coming from the series. What makes me excited about the next episodes is that Casshern is in a pinch and he can’t escape from the clutches of a giant robot!
