Third Episode Test - Ao no Exorcist

What I Know

It might be Ghostbusters.

What The Title Suggests

Something’s exorcist? I’m going with Ghostbusters.

Episode Impressions

A man who lives in a very purple world thinks tenderly to the time he and his brother were raised by priests. Tenderly might be the wrong word to use there.

"His psychotherapist says that's normal at this stage though."

Something’s off about this guy, but I can’t put my finger on it. Besides the strange ears and the upturned nose. Oh wait, I did just put my finger on it.

OP suggests a supernatural action-comedy. I guess I could have seen that one coming. It just might be Ghostbusters after all. To the protagonist’s credit, that thing he’s carting around the entire OP that’s obviously a sword is only actually unsheathed at the very end of the OP. Too many hot-dogging guys love swinging those things around for 3/4 of the musical intro. I like this guy. He’s got economy.

"I appear to be on fire. Little help?"

The protagonist looks for, then finds a clown after the latter attempts to run him over. Not sure what this has to do with exorcism but I’m sure we’ll get there. Clown vampire invites him on a grand adventure… to school.

Oh boy. A school. I assume there will be a bunch of people with supernatural powers and whatnot. Am I close? Am I? Also his brother is going too, although his ears are normal and he has acne or something. He is sooooo gonna get his lunch money stolen by a minotaur.

"I can't believe you fell for that shit, I just pick scary names from literature out of a hat. The hat I'm wearing, in fact. It's a nice hat, and also versatile."

They soon arrive at the True Cross Academy, which is basically three or four Hogwards stacked on top of each other with a smattering of Escher paintings sprinkled to taste. Hat vampire demands our hero undress in front of him in their limo. Is this a show about busting ghosts or the aftermath of a Jay-Z concert backstage affair?

Pointagonist is shocked that his brother is the top of their incoming class, even though he like totally has glasses so that should be obvious. Thankfully some incorporeal students (in that we don’t see them, they’re not actually incorporeal as far as I know) fill us in on this detail. Isn’t he the brother? Shouldn’t he know this stuff? That’s kind of sad if they’re not connecting like that at their age.

This sounds like a good transition but the school is 400 stories high and non-euclidian so I can imagine this trip actually taking up the rest of the run of the show.

Then there are some random flashbacks. It’s probably to the previous two episodes but lacking any context all I know is apparently Farmer Beelzebub exploded or something. I can only wonder what the hell that means for this episode.

The campus is toured, which seems entirely to fill space because I sincerely doubt I will need to remember what the dining hall layout looks like at any point during this show.

Anyway our hero is getting a lot of attention and doesn’t quite know why.

Carrying a sword around the ENTIRE TIME might have something to do with it, but what do I know?

A rather forthright dog soon leads him through eight or nine bizarre dimensions (they may also be classrooms, God alone knows) only to reveal that it wasn’t a dog, but vampire school principal tophat guy in disguise. As a dog. I’m not sure how a dog in a school draws less attention than a vampire, but okay.

Using a magic key that can take him anywhere he wants to go on campus or something, the protagonist is off to a special super top secret area which is designed to train exorcists, which I guess he is. Presumably. I’d hope that’s what the sword is for. Anyway I’m not sure why they’d need to hide a place like this; what are the odds of anyone finding anything in a giant tower of random buildings? Oh well.

Also the hero is the son of Satan. That just came up.

"I dunno chief, it's gonna be kinda hard not to bring up that the Lord of Darkness is my dad every time that subject arises in casual conversation."

Hat guy literally tells him that while it should be possible to fool people about having devil ears, pointed teeth, and a fucking tail, setting people on fire would give it away because… huh? This is a thing that actually happens but I can’t understand the logic behind it in any way whatsoever. Also I never even noticed that he had a tail. Does he have a tail? I didn’t see one the whole episode but I might just be dumb and blind.

And so it’s off to the training room to meet our team of teen exorcists! Most of whom look like complete losers. One of them talks to puppets for Christ’s sake.

I sure hope this isn't their "A" team.

Dog principal exposits on what exorcists are in the middle of the classroom while everyone is watching a dog talk to a guy. No one reacts. Was it even necessary to transform into a dog? Also he blabs out loud that the protagonist is a demon three minutes after warning the hero to keep mum about that. I guess it was only for him not to mention.

Anyway to sum it up: Exorcists are inappropriately touched on their taint by a demon and this enables them to see and fight them. I may have that slightly wrong.

And in a shocking twist, Satan-spawn’s brother is the teacher! Yeah okay fine.

"You remember that time you kicked my sand castle, bro?" "No?" "When I'm through with you, you will regret it."

Apparently while the son of Satan was off doing whatever it is sons of Satan do, his brother was actually training as an exorcist. I guess our hero just never really took an interest in what his brother did or somesuch. Now I feel even worse about the state of their familial relationship. They don’t connect and one of them is adopted.

Glasses brother offers to go through the Taint Ritual with some of the folks who haven’t been molested yet, and for whatever reason everyone agrees. The protagonist is exempt because Satan and all that. The classroom is infested with goblins, which is apparently the supernatural equivalent of ants, so I guess the “ritual” involves letting some ants bite you a little. This seems pretty underwhelming, honestly. Of course his brother got it in a more exciting way.

"So does that mean we, like, did it?" "Only spiritually." "So then we're only spiritually incestuous. Fantastic."

Some demons wind up summoned as a result of an awkward bro-scuffle, but glasses easily disposes of them by shooting them. The other students who were out in the hallway don’t seem concerned by this. Also since these demons were already said to be largely harmless I’m confused as to what possible tension this scene has. It’s basically an excuse to show off.

"Shit, I ain't even lookin'."

Also his brother hates him. So I guess all that palling around in the limo was fake. What a cockmongler. Who’s the real son of Satan here? Oh, right, still the main guy.

All the while they’re arguing the brother is doing gun-kata and shooting wave after wave of enemies, so I’m assuming the boss will be coming soon. Eventually this leads to a gun-on-demonic-hellfire standoff.

I gotta say, my money's on hellfire.

And then the boss shows up. Because it’s gotta have a boss. So our hero killsteals the boss after his brother put in all the effort grinding. Dick.

"Oh riiiiiiiiiiiight, the boss. I thought there was something that comes after the endless minions and hurtful family arguments."

Devil-spawn explains that since their adoptive exorcist father died to protect him from his real dad (presumably in the most metal episode of Maury ever taped), he wanted to become an exorcist himself. Not for revenge, but to get stronger… which… why would you get stronger and become a guy who hunts demons if not to avenge the death of your father at the hands of a demon? That’s what revenge is. You saying that isn’t what you’re doing doesn’t mean you aren’t doing it.

Show Impressions

The show seems to have a really poor grasp on which incredible supernatural thing is actually incredible and which one is all “Psh, whatever.”

Son, you're the spawn of the Devil himself. And you already know that dude is Pimp Dracula. Why is this shocking to you?

Also the layout of their school is nonsensical and insane and I do not envy anyone who has to live or work there. Let alone whoever built it. Ghost slave labor, perhaps, if such a thing is possible.

This is totally understated and coherent architecture, and also not stolen whole cloth from Persona 3.

The action is competently imagined if utterly inconsequential, but I’ll forgive it for an early episode. There’s a decent dynamic between the brother who is a berserking Satan-spawn swordsman who is constantly on fire and his brother who is basically a nerdy version of Christian Bale’s character in Equilibirum. Unfortunately having seen the entire episode there was basically no point in anyone being in it but those two and Demon Liberace. Yet the show is in a school setting, which clearly means there’s going to be a bunch more people on the team at some point. I guess my question is why? Is “two brothers, one Satan’s son, team up to fight demons” not complicated and badass enough for you, Japan? It just seems like that particular premise would work fine without all this other crap.

Did I Miss Something?

Where the hell did all those students they had wait outside go? Was nobody able to overhear repeated gunfire and a bro-fight in the classroom? Did it not dawn on anyone to just take a peek and see what was going on? I realize some of them can’t see demons but a few of them didn’t raise their hands about not having gotten the Peter Parker treatment from a demon yet. Plus everyone can hear a gun.

I swear, no initiative at all.

Also people in this show say things that they know make absolutely no sense.

"Except Satan isn't my father and I'm not a demon and can't catch fire. Also I'm intelligent and have glasses. There's probably other differences, but in all other respects we're the same."

The First Two Episodes Were…

I actually saw flashbacks. A demon farmer and some other guy exploded or something. I guess sword guy ran around shanking other demons for shits and giggles. Or maybe the entrance exam for that school requires kicking a farmer’s ass and the one he picked just happened to also be a demon. All I know is somebody got shanked.

Keep Watching?

If it were “gun-kata professional and his trash-talking Satan-spawn brother kick ass for the Lord” I might be on board, but it looks like they’re gonna pile way too much on top of that and crush the only good ideas with bullshit.

Rewind or No?

Weirdly enough, this felt pretty much like a first episode to me. I don’t really know what that says about the first two, but other than some missing details it’s really not impossible to pick up on and follow where the show is going. It’s just nothing that happens in it seems especially logical or even rational.

Final Single Episode Coherency Rating

3 (William Faulkner)

I get the premise, but pretty much everything else doesn’t seem to make sense. Characters and settings basically ceased to exist when not convenient to the narrative, and there was literally no point in showing off the normal school when everything important is presumably going to happen in the top secret magic classrooms. Plus, I didn’t see half the people in the OP in this episode. How long is this show if some of those main cast members aren’t even mentioned yet?

And it wasn’t Ghostbusters. But throw in a gorilla and we might be close to The Ghost Busters.

I’ll watch Denpa Onna next. Not entirely sure what that one’s about.