10 Second Anime - Dimension W - Episode 12 [END]

Mira helps Mabuchi regain his memories to resolve the mystery of the Genesis coil. Series Finale.

File.12 - "The Future Reached"

Heh.

Now that is how a series finale is supposed to end. Clear enough to answer questions surrounding the immediate plot, but vaguely enough to pose questions for the larger plot and  keep interest going for another installment of the story.

Mabuchi and Miyabi's past story is closed now. But in a way it's not.

Mabuchi remarked that even Mira's palm lines match Miyabi's, that's how closely her body was made to be a replacement for Mabuchi's beloved.

Not only did Mira use that same hand like she did in their first meeting in episode 1 (slap!), but it's Miyabi's hand that helped him regain him missing memories. Well, that and Mira's tail and its special ability to "tune" information touched by Dimension W. Mira was able to reconnect Mabuchi's dimensionally fractured memories and resolve what happened to Genesis and Miyabi's surgery.

Mabuchi destroyed Genesis with the blessing of Miyabi. He had entertained the idea of saving Miyabi's soul with the use of Genesis, which wasn't really a transporter. This is what Professor Yuruizaki found out about Seameyer's research. Genesis actually materializes possibilities from Dimension W and living beings have too many possibilities associated with their souls and consciousness. Only a very focused soul in an instant of time could create himself as he was the moment he used Genesis, which was what accidentally happened when Mabuchi destroyed it at Miyabi's request.

Mabuchi actually witnessed Miyabi's surgical accident. The cybernetic brain Dr. Yurizaki had created wasn't enough to contain Miyabi's "soul" and it was leaking out the coil. This is what both Yurizaki's were working on at the time of Mrs. Yurizaki's death. She had completed the brain part and Mr. Yurizaki was supposed to be working on the coil that would work with it. In the realm of Dimension W's possibilities, he finally completed it and gave it to Mira.

The satisfying part of Seameyer's defeat, part of which was he had lost before he even began because Genesis was already destroyed, was his gaining comfort from his father figure Yurizaki in Dimension W. In the first episode, Yurizaki appeared to have killed himself instead of being taken by New Tesla, but what he did was create a different kind of gate that brought himself whole into Dimension W. This tied in nicely with what Mabuchi told him before he got swallowed up. The world of endless possibility comes from our choices, so don't regret them, but move forward. Don't be so tied to the closed path when there are infinite paths of possibility to your goal even from some supposed failure. Don't give up.

The resolution made it clear that Genesis wasn't the coil that started eating away at the dead zones on Easter Island, since Mabuchi had destroyed it already all those years ago. This is good because it leaves a vagueness to the overall story allowing for more of Dimension W's world to be fleshed out.

Mabuchi's origin story is complete and the next part can focus on Mira. Having Professor Yurizaki return to give her his completed non-official coil to "learn about the human heart" is pretty good proof of that. She can regain her memories of the time spent with him and the story can continue to focus on the source of the illegal coils. These are two main points that began the season but were never answered. This is all good and leads me to hope for another installment of the Dimension W story.

Did I detect some leaning on Miyabi's sister's part in the epilogue toward Mabuchi? Oho. A love triangle between a Mira/Miyabi hybrid personality, a real person and Mabuchi could be very interesting indeed.

Hmm.

So, if Genesis wasn't the coil that woke up on Easter Island, what was? It's no coincidence that the dead zones started dissipating about the same time that Professor Yurizaki opened his own gate to Dimension W in the first episode. Instead of the incomplete "transporter" that Genesis was, Yurizaki's coil appeared to convert an entire person's soul into "possibility." This turns Yurizaki into an angel like figure who can visit with Mira from time to time in an ongoing narrative.

This first season was ultimately about building the world of Dimension W and telling Mabuchi's origin story. The other issues of who killed Mrs. Yurizaki and why and where illegal coils come from appear to be the driving forces behind the larger narrative arc for Dimension W. In a sequel, I suppose one or the other might be resolved, leaving the connected answer of the last one for a final narrative arc. Seeing how different all the other Collectors were and their myriad motivations and business dealings with New Tesla, I can easily see 2 more seasons built around the main narrative arc.

Final Thoughts.

Second season nao! I found this show to be a very consistent sci-fi action thriller with an integrated art design that never wavered. Add in the cute girl comedic elements with a dark hero needing external redemption and we just needed a story hook to keep us interested from week to week. On that hook, the anime producers delivered, letting the bounty hunter subculture draw the audience into the larger yet more interconnected world of New Tesla and our dark hero's relationship with it. I looked forward to every week!

What helped was the mix of stories that helped build up the characters and the world. Sometimes mystery, sometimes crime drama, sometimes slice of life, they were all made interesting by the interplay between Mabuchi and Mira. It really was a Beauty and the Beast story with those two, which mirrored his past love with Miyabi.

Even better, some of the cliffhangers were actually mysteriously satisfying instead of just suspenseful. That made the narrative less predictable in an emotional sense, letting the viewer look forward even more to what was coming next. This was well done in the show and I hope other shows take note of this kind of fun storytelling. It can't be attempted heart attacks every week, or the audience becomes inured to that device.

This show was just a lot of damn fun! It told its story without reservation and without self-consciousness. Sometimes we saw a cute robot giving us naked fanservice. Sometimes we saw a man get kicked out a window in a playful manner. Sometimes we saw a bad guy get his face viciously beaten in. Satisfying!

And it never drowned itself in pathos either. Sure, all of the main characters had really tragic backstories which needed to be told to understand them, but they were told quickly and in the context of the present. Sometimes an action show will suddenly bring the high octane pace to a jarring halt with a flashback, but this show took its time confidently and kept the same emotional pace of the present when it showed those flashbacks.

This is a much more contextual way of using flashbacks in the middle of combat, because the character's emotional state at that time isn't going to reach for a sad slow rainy funeral for inspirational memory, but rather that terrible shocking moment he finds a loved one dead. That's just good storytelling that grounds a flashback in the service of the present story. You know, the one that viewers are supposed to care about? If the author wanted us to care about that flashback so much, why didn't he tell that story instead? Priorities and focus. Dimension W had those in mind with how it presented this season.

I totally recommend this anime to anyone who wants to watch a sci-fi thriller with a gruff hero and a cute girl. That one throws knives and the other is a robot with insane strength only makes it more intriguing. The science fiction premise of another dimension satisfies all the hand waving arguments with enough mumbo jumbo and understanding of quantum mechanics to avoid annoying physics majors. I never rolled my eyes but instead found myself trying to figure out the underlying concepts. Good enough for television! Please, go watch this show if you can and give Mira a few more pats on the head while calling her a "piece of junk" as a term of endearment. Then, dance along with Mabuchi to the opening credit song. You'll thank me for it.