Final Thoughts: Bokurano

Welcome, weebs, to Animated Observations

Well, it took about half a year, but, after a lot of dragging my feet and then finally getting bored one night and deciding to watch the last three episodes, I have finally finished Bokurano, and…wow.

For those who don’t know, Bokurano is tells the story of 15 kids who, one day during summer vacation, discover a strange machine sitting inside a cave on the beach. The machine says their needs to be 15 people to play an unspecified “game.” However, the kids soon realize that the game entails fighting in a giant robot one at a time against other giant robots, and then dying after piloting said robot. These 15 kids are now in a contract they can’t escape.

The Animation/CG

My initial thought is that it might not be fair to compare the show’s animation and CG to other shows, especially since it was made by Gonzo, a studio that was known for the hit or miss quality of its shows. But then I remembered that Bones is a studio that existed at the same time, and was making shows like Eureka Seven that are more than double the episode length of Bokurano and look significantly better throughout. Still, I can’t get to mad. The show looks fine enough and the only part that really bothered me was when they reused CG fight scenes towards the end.

Hot Takes: Jun Edition

Jun is honestly the biggest piece of shit in this entire series aside from Koemushi and low key kind of deserved to die. Like, the kid was continually an abusive piece of shit to his sister all throughout their childhood and was just being an edge-lord for attention.

Parallel Universes and Bokurano’s Story

I’ve always like the idea of parallel universes in stories because it means there is a potential to explore a lot more of the story’s lore. It Bokurano’s case, it is really interesting to think about the millions of potential alternate earths in which kids are suddenly taken away from their home in order to fight in a giant robot and then just die. I could see their being a lot of cool spin offs wit h this setup.

Descending into Sadness

Aside from Jun, a lot of the characters in Bokurano had legitimately heartbreaking stories. Chizuru is the most obvious right off the bat, but then there were characters like Daiichi, who was trying to provide for his family as best he could, only to come to the realization that after piloting Zearth, he would no longer be able to.

Overall, though, good series.

Have you guys seen Bokurano? How do you all feel about it? Let me know in the comments below. Also, if you would like to support The Aniwriter or are just feeling generous, consider supporting me on Ko-fi, or using one of my affiliate links down below: